


Never Anything

by Morgan



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, Pre-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-13
Updated: 2011-12-23
Packaged: 2017-10-26 01:20:56
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 6
Words: 28,467
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/276975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Morgan/pseuds/Morgan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam goes to Stanford and Dean can’t not call him to make sure he’s okay. This is another take on Dean’s line about them not having talked in two years before Dean breaks in.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Call

They don’t talk for about three weeks, which is longer, and shorter than you’d think. Dean can’t handle it, the post-apocalyptic feel of the run down piece of shit house with the wrap around porch they’re living in when Sam leaves in the middle of the night. Dad, well. Dad’s more of a stubborn grouchy bear than normal after that, which makes Dean’s life about as fun as you’d expect.

There’s too much goddamned quiet and Dean’s serving up his own helping of that, he honestly doesn’t think he and dad exchange more than maybe ten words a day, rationing them out like they cost twenty bucks a pop, and Dean’s still coming out ahead on that, because he can’t think of a damned thing to say to the old man that’s going to do anyone any good.

It doesn’t take him that long before he needs to call Sam.

Sam might be stubborn and misguided and a bitch and the worst fucking brother on the planet, but that doesn’t make him any less Sam, any less Dean’s. Dean’s responsibility, Dean’s little brother, Dean’s to worry about and yeah, hell, yeah, he worries. Sammy’s out there alone. Unprotected, for any given value of that with a Winchester. Sam’s got shells and a gun and a knife and other miscellany. He doesn’t have family there to watch his back, but he didn’t want that, so he’s got what he wanted. Might not be what he needs, or what he should have, but Sam wanted this and he’s always been really good at getting what he wants.

Dean’s sitting on the bare cement of a parking lot out on the far edge where it gives up to scrub on a small incline and he’s got his cell out, calling. It’s not like he didn’t know he would and he’s never been able to hold a grudge worth fuck when it comes to Sammy. Unlike his father and his darling little brother, who can hold on to shit so long it petrifies somewhere deep inside them, Dean’s learned forbearance. It doesn’t mean he doesn’t hurt. He just figures it won’t make much of a difference, he’s going to hurt either way.

Three rings and then Sammy’s picking up, which is a good thing because otherwise Dean would have had to drive out there and he’s not sure he could handle having to look Sam in the face without smashing it just yet.

-Yeah? Comes Sam’s voice and it’s tense enough that Dean knows he checked his caller id.  
-Hey, asshole. You get there alright? Dean asks and he can hear Sam blowing out a breath on the other end, steeling himself for a good heap of abuse, no doubt.

Dean’s not calling to give him shit. Oh, he will give Sam shit about this, this is too much of a cluster fuck for him not to do that, but first things first. And first he needs to know that Sam’s okay. There’s a really long pause. It’s so long actually that Dean has to take the phone from his ear and check that the call hasn’t dropped out, or that his brother hasn’t hung up on him, which he’s completely bitchy enough to do.

-Dean, Sam says and it’s… yeah, well, Dean doesn’t really know what it is. Strained. Nervous maybe, a little closed off like he doesn’t know what the hell is coming next.  
-Did you get molested on the bus? Did you share seats with some fat guy who kept farting in you space trying to make like it was the smell of cow shit coming through the window? Have you banged any college chicks yet? Dean says and his voice is a little rusty, it is, because he hasn’t really been talking much lately.

There’s a startled snort at the other end, Sam trying to not find him funny, he knows that sound well enough even if it goes a little weird over the phone. Ether. Lines. Shit, they don’t really have lines anymore, but it’s just too weird to think of things going strange over the satellites, too David Bowie for Dean’s taste. He’s giving Sam another three seconds before he deems this a lost cause and fucking hangs up.

-I’ve been here for like five minutes, Sam says.  
-So? Plenty of time for you to find some nice piece of tail. Get a taste of college life, the real deal and not just some townie in a pleated skirt, man, come on.  
-Don’t be a… hold on, Sam says and he’s talking kind of muffled and Dean can hear him moving.

Right. Roommate, probably. There’s scuffling noises, like Sam’s holding the phone to his chest and then there’s the sound of a door followed by a different kind of quiet. Then Sam comes back to him.

-Shit, Dean, he says and now he sounds so goddamned wrecked on those two words alone that Dean knows he’s just barely keeping it together and fuck, no, they’re not doing that.

He can’t do that.

-Tell me you’re okay, Dean cuts him off and it comes out like an order.

Sam doesn’t even bristle, he just chokes out one of those startled little half-laughs that tell Dean too much.

-I’m okay. And … you? Dean, are you… I mean, dad, he…  
-No, Sammy. We’re fine, Dean says, because he’s not calling about that, he’s not going to have some kind of post-fight run-down with Sam, shit, he’s done that so much he can’t think of a single new thing to say and Sam proved him wrong anyway, for all of how much he had been thinking that Sam would settle down into the life.

Dean can’t afford to start thinking about that, about the last three months and change, because if he does he’s going to get angry all over again, and that’s not what he wants this to be about right now. Dad said a lot of stupid shit, but then so did Sam, and those two have always been able to push each other’s buttons in ways that made Dean feel about four years old. Sam’s always gone straight for the throat with dad, like he doesn’t have any other way of talking to the man. And that’s when he talked at all, not just aimed his pointed silences in dad’s direction.

-Tell me about. Fuck, I don’t know. How are you doing? Dean says and he’s got his eyes closed now.

Silence on both ends, the kind that fuzzes with the static of how fucked up all this is and then Sam starts talking.

They go on like that for about ten, maybe fifteen minutes, because it’s still a lot of stops and starts and false starts and noise and misdirection, but they’re talking.

When they’re done and Dean’s put his phone back in his pocket he rests his head in his hands and just breathes for a couple of minutes. He has to know that Sam’s okay, it’s just one of those things, and it’s always going to be a thing for him. But, Jesus Christ, it still hurts so fucking bad.

It’s every week after that, Dean calling.

Dad probably knows, but Dean doesn’t give a shit. All dad’s big talk didn’t really help, and Dean had tried to explain about Sam, about how you can’t do that with Sam. You have to be different with him because he’s too goddamned smart to be ordered around like dad does with Dean. He doesn’t know when that started, but he’s pretty sure it’s always been that way. You try ordering Sam around and he’s going to get vicious. Dean can get away with it, could get away with it sometimes, when it was pretty basic shit, but when it comes to making real decisions for Sam you have to let him work it out himself.

Sam is smart. Much, much smarter than Dean, maybe even smarter than dad, and dad probably knows that. Dean’s willing to bet that stung. Dad’s still got the years on Sam, though, and brains aren’t always the same as experience. Sometimes Sam still scares Dean, with all that fucking brain power just lying around like unexploded dynamite. He wasn’t wrong about how much damage that could do. Like family means nothing to Sam. The minute Dean starts thinking like that, though, he stops himself. Sammy’s going to do what he’s going to do and fuck the consequences. He’s romancing the normal life he thinks he wants right now, but he’s still taking Dean’s calls at least. That’s something.

Dean’s completely unprepared for it when he calls some weeks later and Sam sounds like he’s been run real hard, like three wraiths in one afternoon hard, and Dean doesn’t like the sound of it.

-Dude, you okay? Dean asks.  
-Yeah, I’m fine.  
-‘Cause you sound like hell.

Sam laughs at him, not like it’s funny, though, just brittle and weird and a little … sad. Which makes no fucking sense what so ever. He’s supposed to be knee deep in beach bunnies and keggers and what ever the hell goes on in sunny Cali when Dean’s not looking. Dean waits, pointedly not saying anything, thinking it’ll make Sam talk, like it does with nervous witnesses. It works better than it should.

-I had a weird dream, Sam says, quietly.

And Dean knows how that goes. He knows “weird” means Sam’s been having screaming nightmares, yes, the kind he wakes up screaming from, and yes, the kind that used to make him cling to Dean like a limpet when he was a kid. And even sometimes when he wasn’t a kid at all anymore. Dean doesn’t want to hear about it, and he’s just got his mouth open to say something about the last hunt, the three legged dog he met the other day, dad’s trick with the glove box and the stolen amex gold card, but he’s not fast enough.

-I dreamt you got cut up so bad dad couldn’t stitch you. Blood all over the backseat, man, I…  
-Hey, it’s okay, I’m fine. Just a shitty dream, alright Sammy? Dean says and he hears himself sounding like every three o’clock in the morning they’ve ever had like that.  
-Yeah, I know. It’s just.

Sam stalls and Dean doesn’t want to know. They talk baseball for a while, even if neither of them give a shit, because it’s like defusing a car bomb by proxy having this goddamned conversation over the phone. Sam surprises the hell out of Dean right before they hang up with a soft “miss you” that sounds like he didn’t intend for it to slip out at all and it’s like being sucker punched right in the eye. Sam’s already hung up by the time Dean starts thinking he should maybe have said something back.

Dean goes out that night. Tells dad not to wait up and goes out, finds the nearest bar and in short order, gets in a game, gets in a brawl and gets in a bottle-blonde girl with too long nails and a bright purple butterfly pinned to the waistline of her skirt. He does well in the game, fucks up the guy he’s fighting enough that his knuckles throb and puts the rest of his restless energy into the butterfly girl, making her scream twice before pulling himself back together and stumbling back to the motel. The kind of alone that Dean gets without Sam makes him need the slam of a fight, the soft of a woman.

The only thing he doesn’t do is get drunk. Dean’s scared that if he does he’s going to have to check his phone with the bartender just to make damned sure he doesn’t call Sammy to tell him… what the fuck? why did you leave? how could you do that to me? Or something equally pathetic that he doesn’t want to have to deal with the fall-out from.

Weeks go by and Dean keeps calling, only now he’s half on alert for it, Sam never says it. Dean thinks it was just the dream, no big, Sam is where he wanted to be. It’s fine.

The price of words goes down a little between him and dad as time wears on, even if he thinks dad’s carrying himself differently now, like there’s more weight on his shoulders, like he’s got new cares and concerns, and sure, he probably does. They split up a couple of times, working different jobs in different ends of the country and Dean knows that dad goes by Stanford, even if he won’t say anything about it, not even a causal “Sammy’s looking good” or whatever. He knows Dean talks to the kid anyway. When they hunt it takes some getting used to, not having Sam there for research and not having Sam’s steady hand with a shotgun, but they adapt.

Or so Dean tells himself.

Then, out of nowhere, middle of October, he thinks it is, Dean calls a little later than usual, because he’s fucked up his knee and he took some painkillers and passed out for a bit and when he calls he’s a little messy and a little lost, because days and weeks and jobs sometimes blend together anyway and he’s not all that sure where the hell the Sunshine-Moonshine-Starshine Lodge is located exactly. Sam can hear it on his voice the second he’s strung more than two syllables together. He shouldn’t be surprised, and he isn’t really.

-How fucked up are you? Sam asks and there’s anger lurking under the concern, the almost inevitable “where was dad?” and “what did you do?” right there on the tip of Sam’s self-righteous tongue.

Sammy’s a stubborn asshole, so even if Dean said he tripped over his own shoelaces and fucked himself up, it would still somehow be dad’s fault, or the hunt, or the life, or any of the other about five thousand gripes Sam has about how they were brought up and how they get on by in the world. But… That dream that had Sammy so messed in the head a while back is still there too, and Dean’s willing to bet it’s not the only one, it’s not the only time Sam’s woken up like that without Dean there to take his fists and his useless struggle and without Dean there so Sam could press his face into Dean’s shoulder and muffle the tears that almost always came out no matter how fucking hard he fought it.

-Banged up my knee some, but I’m okay. Not bleeding, or anything.

“Not anymore”, Dean thinks and he knows when he hears Sam draw breath that this is going to get a different kind of ugly right now.

-Where was dad? Sam ask, cold, clipped.  
-Working his own job. Come on, Sammy, don’t. I’m fine.  
-If you’re so fucking fine why are you calling me in the middle of the night sounding like you don’t even know where the fuck you are?

And, yeah, that’s the problem, right there. Sammy knows him too well. Dean stares at the water stain on the ceiling and thinks “fuck it, I’m done” and goes to hang up when he hears Sam barking out his name and then Sam starts talking fast.

-Don’t hang up, Dean, please, alright? I’m sorry. Don’t hang up. I didn’t mean it like that. You got to be careful. I worry, okay?

And Dean’s got this ache. Not in the knee, that’s just pain, but he’s got this ache like he doesn’t even know what and he’s going to say something stupid he just feels it.

There was never a conscious point where it started between them. Dean woke up one night, little Sammy's hard-on pressed into his hip and it wasn't anything. Sam wasn't even awake, just rocking his hips mindlessly deep in his slumber and drooling a little on Dean's pillow. It wasn't anything, not even a second’s worth of “what the fuck” because it was just Sammy, just nature, and Dean had done that himself before he figured it out enough to take care of himself in the shower, like with any other chore, and that's maybe more sad than him putting his hand on Sammy's hip, not to push him away, but to help him along, not even all that awake himself. Slender boy bones under his hand and Sam moving animal against him, nothing like what he was when awake.

It wasn't anything. It was never anything. So, one night Dean felt Sam's mouth drag open against his skin, over his neck to his throat, and that was something, made a streak of heat shoot down his body and that was something, of course it was, but it wasn't anything. It was still just him and Sammy, even if he figured out that Sam's eyes were open more often than not after that and his own hands were helping more than before, pushing at Sam, dragging at him, bringing him along, making it fast and easy. Sam seemed less than awake and aware anyway, but he wasn't all the way asleep either, which Dean figured out one night when Sam's hand came to rest low on his stomach and stayed there, making him sweat through the fabric of the raggedy tee he was sleeping in.

Dean's not even sure when the fucking started. By then Sam's hand on him, or his hand on Sam was as familiar as their own and there didn't seem any point in being weird about that, though Sam had his moments. Sam's never pulled his punches with Dean either, saying “normal” in that pointed, terrifying way that makes what they are seem anything but, only, not in a good way, not in a us-against-the-world way, but in the other way, the one that says a whole team of headshrinkers aren't ever going to be able to put him and Sam right, but who the fuck cares, really? It's not anything, except for when it was. And there were always girls, irrespective of that. For both of them. That had nothing to do with it.

Sam's always had this ability to think himself into corners and box himself in with random shit, like a sudden love of religious dogma that only ever lasted until he found the next theory to debunk it all. He would pray to a god he liked more as a concept than an actual practical reality and load his shotgun with rocksalt and sprinkle holy water on Dean and demand Dean take him to mass for the blessing, but then Dean would flip the book Sam was sleeping with over to read the title and it was “Thus Spoke Zarathustra” and “Being and Time” and Dean would wonder how Sam got all this to hold together in that shiny brain of his. It didn't, is the answer. Belief and un-belief kept uneasy truce within Sam's thinking most of the time and that's why he tore at everything, picked everything apart and that included Dean. He expected it from someone who could read something like “what is the being that will give access to the question of the meaning of Being?” and actually think about that without breaking his brain.

The feel of Sam in his hand was as familiar as anything by the time Sam licked at his hipbone and said “Dean? Can I taste?” and Dean should have put a stop to that, sure, because Sam was so young, but on the other hand it was exactly because of that that it didn't mean anything, it wasn't anything. It was a mouth instead of a hand, and hey, no one says no to a willing mouth, not the way Dean figures it. It was that time, when Sam climbed slowly up his body after and kept asking “what are we doing, Dean, what are we doing?” And Dean had never really felt guilty about it, any of it, except when Sam sounded like that, like he didn't fucking understand and it was causing him pain.

It didn't last beyond Dean sticking a hand down Sam’s shorts saying “anything you want, Sammy” and “feels good, whatever. Feels good, right?” like that was any kind of answer, which, honestly, it wasn't. Sam wanted it. That was good enough, had to be. It wasn't anything. It was good. It was too good, maybe, especially once Sam started growing into his arms and legs like the promise of him being fulfilled.

That's where things got really out of hand. Dean remembers that too, lying face down on some god-awful slippery bedspread in the boonies somewhere, the scent of apricots heavy in his nostrils from the air freshener. Sam on top of him, grinding down on his still boxer clad ass and more than a little fucked up on cheap booze and just the moment, probably, more than anything the moment, alone like they were, dad out and gone and the hunt over and all that adrenaline and heady almost-freedom getting to them. He remembers the noises Sam made like he's got them on repeat in his head, soft noises, frustrated, and Sam had been all over him that time, more skin than clothes.

They'd been doing everything else by then, sucking and rubbing and touching, and it feels to Dean like it's been all their lives, nothing remarkable about that, not really. Just bodies in motion and feeling good, and that sense that he could get Sam to shut his brain down for a little while, get him to focus on the good of things, on the moments when it actually was good, so good, so real between them that there was salt-sweat to lick at and Sam's eyes blown wide and then closed tight shut.

There, in that room, on that bed, Sam moving over him, bigger now and stronger but still with so much coltish youth to his body, Dean knew he could have turned it all around, thrown him off and made him back down and then Sam moaned like he didn't really know what he was doing, his hips in a liquid slide, saying into Dean’s skin “want to fuck, so bad, Dean, ah, God” and Dean … Dean said “yes”, said “yeah, okay”, said “come on”.

Shockingly Sam had been good at it, right from the start, like he was with most anything he really set his mind to. All the good-natured ribbing Dean put him through, all the shit he gave him, and Sammy was so goddamned good at it, and knew just how much to push, how far to go before giving Dean a moment. Dean had fucked his fair share of virgins and more than his fair share of everyone else by then, and he knew it was hardly ever that easy the first time around and that it took more to get good at it than just wanting it real bad, but Sammy knew him and that... that seemed to make all the goddamned difference. So they kept doing it, kept getting better at it, until Dean couldn't help make comparisons. There was no one else like Sammy, because, yeah, Sam, but even with that, it was still better.

Dean never fucked Sam though, lord knows, he thought about it. Thought about what it would be like to lay Sam down and open him up with tongue and fingers and then slide on home to the look in Sam's eyes. It's not like Sam didn't offer, it's not like Sam didn't try going on his belly once or twice, but Dean made some lines for himself. Sam at fifteen was not his to have like that. And that's about where it started, maybe some months this way or that, because Dean thinks that first time was earlier, but he's never been all that good at the passage of time. Measures in other things, and it's easy to forget how old Sam actually was when he's always had the oldest eyes Dean's ever seen.

Then there's the thing where Sam is smart as all hell, but Dean's not so stupid that he doesn't see how that would come back to bite them if anyone ever found out. Somehow, no matter how good it was, how it was just them, it's not like Dean doesn't understand that the rest of the world won't see it that way and the rest of the world should never look at Sam and see some wayward ward of the state that let his big brother fuck him in the ass. Dean's not stupid, okay? It's not like he doesn't know the words, it's not like he doesn't get what they're doing, how off the grid it is. It's still him and Sammy, though, except for how it isn't now, not anymore.

Dean remembers nights when Sam was out cold after and he lay there, pillow propped against the headboard, picking up whatever book Sam was carrying around and reading "I make myself flesh in order to impel the Other to realize for herself and for me her own flesh. My caress causes my flesh to be born for me insofar as it is for the Other flesh causing her to be born as flesh." or “Faith is not a question of the existence or non-existence of God. It is believing that love without reward is valuable.” Dean's not too proud to admit it made his head hurt sometimes. And that was Sam at fourteen doing his goddamned best to give himself an ulcer or an aneurism, just over-thinking shit as usual. Except, it wasn't like that for Sam. For Sam all that was just brain feed, stuff he read to keep from getting bored. He wasn't even trying to impress anyone, which for some vague and obscure reason would probably have made Dean feel better. This way, this way he sort of always knew that Sam was going. Sam was leaving. Sam was too good to be wasted in this life that was bound to be nasty, brutish and short and half of Dean was selfish enough to not want to have to go that road alone, where the other half wanted Sam out and safe so bad it hurt some nights.

He still rolled over for Sam any time he wanted it. Went to his knees as often as he could, at Sam's feet and that was as much worship as he could manage sometimes, just thinking that Sam was better, worth more, even when Sam moaned and begged to be allowed to return the favor while Dean was still going down on him, spilling filth about how good he would make it for Dean until the idea of Sam's mouth on him was pretty much as good as the reality of it. They were careful in all the ways they had to be, because of dad, because of the rest of the world, because Dean knew that John Winchester would put a gun to his head and never think twice about it.

It all comes back to Dean when he's talking on the phone with his little brother, who is too far away, and too messed up to be messed with. It all comes back when Sam says he worries and Dean is two parts pissed off, one part hurt and needing something that was probably never really his to have. All those nights he had asked whatever deity could be bothered to listen to keep his little brother safe and still not wanting to be without him... it's been a lot of things, but easy ain't one of them.

Sam tells him to please be careful and he's glib when he responds. He is glib because if he says anything even remotely like what he really wants to say it's going to be “what's the point, Sammy?” and “what do you care, you left” and shit like that is not going to fly, because Sam is still talking to him and that's something, right? It's still something. Because if he starts talking that way Sam is fully capable of just hanging up on him and then not picking up when next Dean calls.


	2. Variations On A Theme

It's after that night, the night when Dean's banged up his knee and taken too long to figure out where he is, that Sam starts saying it when Dean calls.

-Miss you, Sam says.

He says it every single time.

Dean tries to brush it off at first. He tries to make light of it, make it a joke, tries to not say “why did you leave, then?”, tries not to say any of the goddamned things he's thinking, so he winds up saying not much of anything at all, and worse, he starts waiting for it. Sam's low, hushed voice, like he's talking somewhere semi-public, like maybe out in the hallway, a staircase, a fire escape, saying “I miss you” to the brother he left behind like so much dead luggage and through-read books.

Dean never smiles at it. No matter what other tall tales he's telling “this girl, Sammy, Jesus, you should have seen her” and “drove past a plastic pig by the roadside about the size of that shit-box house we lived in outside Topeka that one time, remember? The one with the yellow couch?” he can't think of a single thing to say to Sam's quiet and sincere “miss you, man”, “I miss you, Dean”, “miss you, bro”. Variations on a theme that Dean doesn't know the meaning of.

Dean asks Sam about his classes, his roommate, if he's got enough money. He asks about girls, guys, whatever. He asks about Sam's life and Sam gives as good as he gets. He asks about Dean, about hunts, about the car, the life, the hook-ups, because he knows Dean well enough to know there's going to be women. Maybe guys too, except for Dean that's too wrapped up in Sammy and he can't seem to get there with anyone else, not really. Though a mouth is a mouth and all that, and Dean's no saint, it's not like he's going to pass up on good head, but every time he slides his fingers into too-short hair he has to actively work not to go as limp as a cooked sock. Girls all look the same. No matter if they're blonde or black or redheads, they all look the same to Dean. He know what that is, what it means.

He's not sure how much of what Sam tells him is bullshit, but that goes both ways, because Dean says he's fine when he's laid up with three broken ribs and Sam goes “not as fine as all that, asshole, I can hear you breathing careful”. Sam knows him, is the problem. He knows Sam too. Can hear when he's too stressed out by all that normal that's giving him the run-around, and all that stability, itching under his skin.

-Go out and get laid, Sammy, Dean tells him. “Get drunk. Hit on some pretty girls, talk shit at the bar, get in a fight. You still do that, right? You haven't turned into a complete pussy out there, have you?”   
-Screw you, Dean, Sam tells him and the tightness in his voice says something, says more.

It gets a little hairy one night when Dean's slightly drunk when he calls. Sam picks up on it fast and it's like he's been waiting for it. Not really all that surprising, it was bound to happen some time and it's been more than six months, so Dean doesn't have the burning need to chew Sam out anymore.

-It's two in the morning, Dean, is how Sam answers the phone, but Dean can tell he wasn’t sleeping.   
-Yeah? Sorry.   
-Nawh, it's okay.

And the thing is, Sam knows from those two words how deep into it Dean is. Dean's on his lone bed, Dad's in Georgia and Dean's … Dean doesn't have his head on straight. He's sprawled out and missing Sam so bad, just the weight and feel of him next to Dean on the bed, the way Dean was bound to wake up with Sam's book stabbing him in the kidneys and Sam's arm slung over his chest, Sam's cock against his hip, fuck, all that, he misses it so bad it's like an open chest wound. It's fucking lonely on the motel bed without Sammy tonight and he should have known better than to pick up the phone when it's like this.

Sam lets him get away with all the usual, casual bullshit for a good five minutes, even if Dean's words take a little longer to float to the surface. Dean's free hand is resting on his chest, on the thump of his heart, because he won't do anything about that longing clawing in the pit of his stomach. It doesn't matter if he doesn't, though. He can hear Sam moving, walking, and then the soft click of a door. Dean's still asking the same things he's always asking, if Sam's okay, if he's met anyone, if he's got enough cash, if he needs anything and Sam keeps telling him yes, no, yes, no and Dean thinks the answers are worse bullshit than his questions, so words just slip right out of his mouth.

-I don't want you to be lonely, Sammy, Dean says.   
-So come see me, Sam answers easily, like it's nothing.

And that? That aches so much fucking worse than just hearing Sammy saying “miss you”. It aches so that Dean has to press his palm flat to his chest and start rubbing circles before he makes the big mistake of opening his goddamned mouth again. Neither of them say anything for a beat, and Dean's not sure how long, his perception's a little fucked up. It takes a while, but then Sam's talking again, like it wasn't actually Dean's turn.

-Come out here, Dean. We'll go to a bar, hustle the locals, get in a fight. Come see me. I want...Dean, miss you so much.

Dean's shaking his head no, but he's struck mute, images in his mind, the feel of Sam near him so real, so real when he's got Sammy's voice in his ear like this, all low and earnest. Sam isn't begging, he's painting pictures, making it real already, making it something Dean could actually do, like it's possible. Just get in the car and drive, he’s not that far away, he could maybe make it by morning, even, if he wasn't so fucked up.

Sam doesn't need him though, not really. Sammy doesn't need him there in sunny California, and shit, Dean should hang up on him. Should just end the call, saying “I'll talk to you later, man” or maybe “I'm too drunk for this shit” or something like it. Stop calling for a while, because this isn't helping. It's not making anything better for either of them, rather the contrary and it's shit, the way things are going, because Dean wants to go see Sammy, he wants to so bad. And he can't. Shouldn't. Sam left and that was his choice and that's fine, that's his way of trying to stick his hand up Normal's jumper and get to second base. Sammy's worth that.

Dean's only going to fuck it up if he goes. Fuck it up bad, because he misses Sam, body heat on the bed beside him, Sam's crazy intricate mind and steady gun-hand, Sam's flashflood temper and his quicksilver smile, his unruly hair and runner's grace, all of it. He misses having someone to just goddamned talk to in between hunts when bars are not enough, when the easy steady tread of their life turns grim and harrowing. Dad isn't there. Dad's never been anything but a steady presence, but he's more gone than there most of the time now, and always on the job even when he's trying to kick back and watch a game and … that's not all Dean's missing.

He's missing the weirdest shit, like the sight of Sammy's clothes mixed in with his when he does laundry and the way Sam eats apples with his knife, cutting neat slices without looking up from what he’s reading. He's missing being fucked by Sam, being spread out under him, held and broken. Dean mumbles something about getting some goddamned sleep and hangs up before he can say something more damning, like “yes, yeah, I'll be there soon, Sammy”.

He doesn't call for a couple of weeks after that. It's not 'cause he's a coward, it's not because Sam cored him more efficiently, more neatly than he ever did with his apples with those words. It's because Sam meant them, every last one, and Dean's not a coward, he's not. But he's fucking weak.

Sam is still a stubborn little shit, though. The whole time he's been letting Dean call the shots, but that was never going to last. So this time Sam the one. And Sam’s not drunk, but he’s something. Wrecked on too much reading and not enough real food and sleep, if Dean knows him at all, and Dean does.

-What? Dean asks in lieu of greeting.

There’s a pause on the other end and Dean looks around, checking that he’s not going to be overheard, which is stupid, he’s in the car, parked nice and easy out of the way on a little service road and he’s supposed to be sleeping. He’s got another grueling drive ahead of him if he’s going to make the coordinates he got from dad in the next twenty-four.

-Wanted to talk to you, Sam says. “You. Haven’t been.”   
-What do you want? Dean asks, and it doesn’t come out like he meant it too, angry and short, instead it’s all slow and tired.   
-You haven’t been calling, Sam says and there’s soft accusation there, like maybe he’s thinking he did something wrong.

And he did. He fucking did, okay? Sammy fucked up and Dean should tell him, should say “don’t do that to me, man, don’t you do that” because Sam left him, Sam left and Dean’s the one who’s been mending bridges, building them even, and now he’s too tired to really have this conversation, even if it’s good to hear Sam’s voice.

-I didn’t mean. Look, Dean, I didn’t mean to put you on the spot, I’m sorry, okay? I won’t do that again, but you can’t call me and then just not call me, because I worry. Keep thinking you’re lying dead in a ditch somewhere.

And, yeah, Dean’s worrying a little about that himself. He should make up some bullshit lie here, say he’s been on the job, he’s been with dad, which he has, the whole time, but that never stopped him before, so it isn’t going to hold water and he knows that. So does Sam. So he doesn’t say it, not at all. Instead he says he’s okay, everything’s just peachy. Sam makes a noise, one of those little disgruntled half-amused, half-disgusted noises that sound so old on Sam.

-You, Sammy? You alright?   
-Worrying about my asshole brother, but other than that, yeah, I’m fine.

They don’t talk for long, not that time, because Sam can’t afford to, but they get through the basics and Dean keeps his eyes shut. It makes him feel like he’s closer than he is, when there’s a whole lot of towns and fields and farms and cities and power plants and airfields and people between them. Dean knows that Sam is probably smart enough, is definitely smart enough, to know he seeded something, though. The idea that Dean could go see him is there now, in ways it wasn’t before. Sam still ends the call with “miss you” before he hangs up so fast he doesn’t hear Dean’s answering curse. Or the almost noiseless reply that sounds a lot to Dean like “miss you too” even if he doesn’t give it enough air to make it all the way past his lips. Dean hangs up feeling useless and drawn, but the week after that he’s the one who calls, because his bill gets paid out of some bogus John Smith card.

Dad keeps Dean real busy for a couple of weeks and time runs by like a rapid and he’s working the job as hard as he can. The thing they’re after is not a ghost or a creature that they’ve ever run into before. John’s stumped and Dean knows exactly what they need, which is Sammy, because if there was ever something Sam was good at, it’s finding that one thing that stands out about a case that could set them on the right track, but when they talk, which they do one afternoon when dad’s at the local library, Dean doesn’t mention it at all. See? They don’t need him. No one’s dying, not yet, anyway and dad wanted Sammy gone, so he can goddamned do the work on this one while Dean lays on the motel bed and talks to his brother about source criticism and the shocking lack thereof amongst his fellow students.

-It’s like they’ve never heard of cognitive authority and source evaluation, swear to god, Sam says with deep disgust in his voice.

Dean’s not smart the way Sam is, so he would call that the bullshit-o-meter. He’s got a good one, and Sam’s stared down the business end of bad research a couple of times with nothing but a gun and a prayer, so they’re not as lax about that shit as the kids Sam’s taking classes with. You verify your sources and you find independent evidence and try real hard not to buy into anyone’s hyperbole. For them it can mean the difference between saving lives or getting eaten. That kind of thing tends to sharpen your focus, if nothing else.

-You set ‘em straight, Dean says and he’s actually smiling, like he hasn’t for days, he can feel the tug of it at the corners of his mouth, because Sam all riled up like this is one of his favorite versions.

There’s quiet, then, and for some reason Dean’s stomach tightens. He can’t even really say why, but he can feel the wind shift in Sam’s thinking.

-I went on a date, he says and it’s so out of the fucking blue that Dean’s smile dies like it was never even there. He can still play the part, though, especially over the phone when Sam can’t read his eyes.   
-About bloody time. Good for you, Sammy. Did you get lucky? Or is it a long game?

But Sam doesn’t take the bait, starting up with that bare-bones honest voice again that makes Dean’s heart feel like he’s been mainlining espresso.

-Wasn’t anything. Should have been, though, you should see this girl. Legs all the way up to here, and gorgeous, Dean, so fucking pretty it’s goddamned awful. And nice. Too good for me.   
-Shut your mouth, no one’s too good for you, Dean says and he doesn’t have to fake that part, at least.   
-Yeah, she really is. Spent the whole time talking about relevance logic. Turned me on, man.   
-You’re a weird kid. Pretty and smart, sounds right up your alley.

There’s a long pause and they’re running out of time. Sam’s got somewhere to be, Dean’s got somewhere to be. Dad’s bound to be heading back. There’s a hunt to prepare for.

-I fucking hated it, Sam says suddenly.   
-What? Dean asks, stomach leaden now, because this is where it all comes out.

This is where Sam tells him all about how he hated the life, about how he hated what dad turned them into, what Dean did to him, what they were together and it’s going to be the death of Dean, because he’s not going to give a shit about keeping himself alive on this hunt after that.

-The whole time I just kept thinking her eyes are the wrong color, she wouldn’t get that joke about the hunter and the bear and she wouldn’t laugh if I shot my straw paper at her soda and hit it. I miss you, Dean.   
-‘S not how this works, Dean says without checking himself.   
-I know that, Sam tells him, frustrated and angry.   
-Can’t have it and eat it too, Sammy.   
-Sure I can. Could if you wanted.   
-I got to go, Sam. Catch you later, Dean says and hangs up.

When dad comes through the door Dean’s disassembled his gun and he’s cleaning it, again, even if he doesn’t really need to. They’re going after some malevolent human-horse-fish hybrid and the job is going to get sticky and wet and disgusting from what Dean can tell. He’d still rather do that, rather be up to his elbows in the guts of that thing, than having to continue that conversation with Sam.

It's a year, a goddamned year, Sammy gone all that time and theoretically doing well, but he seems progressively more dejected. Dean hears it in his voice when they talk even when they're keeping it all on the surface and as light as they can. Sometimes when Dean wakes up in the middle of the night he fumbles on the bed next to him for the body that should be there, that's most always been there, knee to his back and bony shoulder pushed into his. He only does that when he's not awake yet, when his heart and head are roving in the gray zone of near wakefulness, the hypnagogic state, and, yeah, Sam taught him that word. Dean turns over and curls in around the dull pain in his chest, like it even matters. Like it makes any difference.

Dad has him hunting ghosts in Virginia Beach when he calls Sam and it rings through to voice mail. Dean's not all that worried. Virginia Beach boardwalk off season and Dean's not enjoying it, but whatever. He calls again a couple of hours later. Still no answer.

Dean isn't going to worry. He's got his own shit to take care of and too much and not enough of whatever the ghost standing in a second story window doing nothing more threatening than glaring at people is about. Dean thinks it's busy work. Dad's been even less interested in Dean's society lately. It's not like being pushed gently out the nest, learning to fly. It's not like he hasn't been working alone most of the time anyway, and even when dad's there Dean's getting more of the corporal than his father.

Dean goes back to his hotel, does some laundry and stares at the goddamned ocean. It's not as pretty as you'd hope, not that he has any sentimental ideas about that one way or the other. Sam still isn't picking up when he calls again, and it's fine, it's okay, Dean doesn't know his schedule all that well and he's probably got class, or a study date at the library, or whatever the hell it is he's doing during all those unaccounted for hours that he doesn’t talk about.

When Dean's been up and down the boardwalk three times and found a whole lot of nothing, he gives up the gig as some kind of urban legend tourist trap and figures fuck it.

Three thousand miles, a two day drive at least. That's how far away Sammy is. Three thousand miles and Dean hates that he's doing the math, mapping out the trail, thinking about where to stop. Dean could go. There's nothing keeping him here, nothing to hold him. He's not working on anything. He can't get a hold of Sam on the phone and there are a thousand innocuous explanations. He could be out on a date. Maybe he forgot to charge his cell, except, no, they don't do that. He could have...fuck, there are so many things, so many simple harmless things, but the problem is there are a hell of a lot of not so harmless things too, and Dean doesn't want to, but he thinks about those. Dean's imagination is pretty vivid, even when he's not leaning on experience.

Dean could drive out there.

He shouldn't.

But he could.

Sam is supposed to be having this whole thing going on, this life that he's been working so hard for, this Normal college kid existence, all that. But, fuck knows, and Dean knows too, that it's not like the things they hunt have ever given a shit about should-have-beens and might-have-beens or prayer and petition. Then somehow Dean winds up thinking about all the things that Sam is supposed to have and how they keep hanging half-way with this bullshit between them, him calling and Sam asking him to come out and it's not supposed to be like that, it's not supposed to be like Sam is waiting for him to show up, set up shop, what the hell ever.

Sam is supposed to be working it like you do any good con, he's supposed to be getting the pretty girl with the legs into his bed and he's supposed to make friends with those asshole rich kids that can further his career. Instead he keeps sounding so tired and wrecked down when Dean talks to him, like he doesn't have anything out there, and that's not the way it's supposed to be. And now he isn't even fucking picking up at all. Dean doesn't want to think about it anymore, but no matter how many times he flips through the channels or tries to focus on anything else, he can't stop the niggling feeling in his gut from starting to work like a magnetic pull.

Dean falls asleep, fully dressed, bags packed already. It's late, late, late when Sam calls him. Dean isn’t really even awake when he answers.

-Hey, wake up, Sam says loud and belligerent right in his ear.   
-It’s four in the morning, what the hell, Dean says and rubs at his eyes.   
-Where the fuck are you? And it sounds like Dean’s dumped him somewhere and he was supposed to pick him up and forgot.   
-Fuck you, Sammy. Where the hell have you been? Dean shots back, because, damn it.   
-Out, comes Sam’s sullen reply.

Dean swallows down his first impulse, pick that apart, because he hears it now. Sam’s wet breathing, the sanded-down edges of his words. He’s drunk and pissed and hurting and he’s looking to take it out on Dean.

-Call me in the morning when you’re sober, Dean says and he’s fumbling for the button when Sam calls his name and Dean’s a sucker so he puts the phone back to his ear and cracks out a “what?”  
-They’re nothing like you, you know? Sam says and it’s confessional, low, not angry at all, but sad. “And… And I know this is fucked up, Dean. I know. But. I miss you, man. Come see me.”   
-Sam…  
-Okay, okay. I’ll hang up. Okay? I will. Just, can you tell me?   
-What?   
-Dean, come on. It’s been a year. Just this one time.

Dean isn’t sure, but he thinks he kind of knows and it’s not good. This is all the things the way they shouldn’t be and Sammy knows that too. He left and Dean’s plenty angry about that, but he can’t hold on to it when Sam sounds like this.

-What?  
-Don’t do that. Just one time, tell me, come on. I have.

And there it is. A year of it, pretty much and Dean’s been ducking that from the get-go. He knows it’s not going to work tonight, and all he can hope is that Sam’s too drunk to have the perfect recall he usually prides himself on.

-What is it you want to hear, Sammy, huh? You fucking left.   
-Yeah, I know. Just. I need it, Dean.

Dean bangs his head back to the wall a little and thinks about Sam’s smile and his knife and his hands.

-Go to bed, Sam. Call me in the morning, when you’re fucking sober… if you have the balls.

And just as he goes to hang up he hears Sam saying “I _miss_ you”.

And, the little shit knows what he's doing, always knows what he's doing, because that's the thing, isn't it? Dean's been missing Sam since he walked out the goddamned door, leaving everything to Dean, leaving Dean to deal with dad and with the life, all of it. It's not just the way they were together that got ripped apart, it's all the things that kept Dean functioning in a life where he's been so caught and buried within it that he's never going to get to do what Sam's trying for.

Now he's lying with his eyes wide open, staring at the ceiling thinking about Sam, Sammy, thinking about him. Thinking about Sam thinking about them. It's actually pretty surprising that they haven't gotten around to that yet, with all of how much they've been talking on the phone. Dean's awake, and awash with the kind of adrenaline he always gets from a fight with Sam, and he's hard. He's not sure when that happened, if he was already there when he woke up to Sammy's angry voice.

He thinks about sleeping with Sam's face pressed into his shoulder, Sam's hand on his stomach. He thinks about all the other things too, what it was when it was really goddamned good, but mostly that sticky moment of togetherness haunts him now. And it annoys Dean to no end, what he's about to do. It annoys him that he's pushing his hand into his jeans and thinking about Sam's hands on him. There's bitter frustration crawling through him along with the other things he's so good at pushing down.

But it's Sam's touch he thinks of, Sam's mouth, Sam's skin sliding on his. It's all the ways in which it's better because Sam knows him, knows how press down and arch up, how to palm him just right, how hard to push. There's always been an element of animal physicality to Sam when he's hungry for it that seems so incongruous coming from someone who lives in his head as much as Sam tends to do, that only means he gives himself over hard to the moment when he's with Dean. That wild, unbridled side to Sam is not something he shows just anyone and Dean knows that to be a fact. Sammy, so polite with his girlfriends, careful with them in a way he never needed to be when it was them. Sam holding on to him, hard and sure, chest to chest, pressing in close, was a lot of things, but never careful, never afraid to bruise. Never polite.

Dean comes like that, hand down his jeans, Sammy on his lips and in his mind, all the things they can do so well together a blur in his memories. And it only leaves him angry.

The next day dawns and Dean’s on the road, barreling down the freeway when his cell goes off in his pocket. He doesn’t think for a second that it’s Sam when he answers. It has to be dad, or one of his few contacts, because he knows little brother.

Only, he maybe doesn’t know Sammy as well as he thought he did.

-There’s nothing wrong with the size of my balls, you fucking coward, Sam tells him, steamrolling past any kind of greeting, like they’re right in the middle of a conversation.

And maybe they are.

-Good to hear, Dean says, looking distractedly for somewhere to pull over.   
-I miss you and I want you to come visit me. Right the fuck now, Dean.   
-I’ve had nicer invitations, Dean deflects.   
-Fuck you. I want to see you.   
-I’m hearing an awful lot about what you want, and I told you that’s not how it works.

The line goes dead just like that. Dean tucks the phone a little under his thigh and keeps driving, and this time he’s closer to the mark of how well he knows his brother, because Sammy’s not going to let it go that easy.

The problem is that is seems like Normal is cockblocking Sam and he's getting what he wants only to find it's not what he wanted. Or, not everything he wanted. It's all the same with Sam. He lasts maybe half an hour and Dean picks up on the first ring.

-You don't think it matters at all, do you? Sam says.  
-Which part? The part where you want what you want or the part where you can't always get what you want? Dean asks and he's feeling pretty good about this now, riding fast and easy, no music because he doesn't really need it.  
-The part where all I did was go to college. I never said I don't want my family, Dean.

Dean lets that sit, turning it this way and that. It's not wrong. It's not right. It's not anything, but it is definitely something. It's Sam's brain twisting itself around, snake in a trap, trying to find the wriggle-room Dean usually leaves him.

-When you say family, you're not talking about dad.  
-He's the one who said I had to pick, he's the one who said if I go I got to stay gone. I never wanted that.  
-Of course not. You still walked, though, Sammy, and I'm the one who’s been calling, so you have some kind of mind on it, don't you?  
-I'm calling now.  
-'cause you want something.  
-Oh, fuck you, Dean. Where are you?  
-What's it to you?  
-Just... where are you?  
-Give it up, Sammy. It's not going to happen.

There's a long pause and Dean's still driving so his mind is in that fluid state where he's scanning the road and making decisions with half his brain while the rest of his attention is on the silence coming down the line.

-Yeah. Okay, Sam says finally and he sounds tired and defeated. “Talk to you later”.

He hangs up and Dean's not surprised. When it's threats and abuse Dean's more sanguine about it. But when Sammy starts sounding hurt and beaten there's a tug and a pull. Dean bullies his way past anything that might be making him feel the same way the first couple of times he hears it after that and they talk about the same stupid shit they've been talking about all along when Dean calls over the next couple of weeks.

Sam seems to settle down, but there's a heavy funk hanging over him. Dean asks about classes and courses and money and girls and Sam gives pretty much the same answers he's been giving the whole time, only now Dean feels how hollow they ring, how little those one worded replies give away and Dean's been fucking stupid all along, too busy ducking and weaving to pay attention to the fact that Sam's doing the exact same thing, with one big difference.

Sam doesn't say anything about wanting Dean to come out there for a while, pretty much resigning himself to the no Dean gave him. It only makes Dean hear the resignation in his voice clearer. There's real blues in Sam's tone suddenly, like he finally came to some point where he realized it was what it is now. Something's over, something's changed. Maybe them, maybe not them the way they are, but the way they were back then, it's gone.

Which is complete and total bullshit, judging from the dreams that have Dean humping the mattress when he wakes up with a pitiful whine at the back of his throat. But he will call it good anyway.


	3. Tug Of War

Dean has this clear and vivid memory of Sammy when he was about seventeen, scrawny as all hell. They were more or less squatting in a run down cabin with an open fireplace that smoked a little at first when Dean lit the damp firewood that had been stacked on the porch. Sam had been sitting on the raggedy couch tucked into the corner, folding himself in so small because it had been cold and they were wired and hard-run.

Sammy's jeans were torn and dirty at the knees and he'd gotten soaked in the rain so Dean had given him his leather to wear on top of his hoodie and canvas, because Dean didn't even feel the cold and Sam's teeth were chattering. Two days of running through the woods and then a short battle that kicked them around hard enough that everything seemed momentously dangerous for a few minutes and dad had set them up at this place and headed back out and Dean had been left to look after Sam and get them settled. It was better that way.

Sam had taken off his wet ratty sneakers and pulled his feet up on the ancient couch and he had been huddling in Dean's jacket, head propped on the backrest and watching Dean work though half-closed eyes. In the gloom Sam looked young and thin and vulnerable in Dean’s too-big leather and so old at the same time, the look in his eyes like a solider at the front, in the trenches, resting between barrages. Dean had hated that, and understood it and loved it at the same time, that deep feeling of concord, that sense that they were to each other a whole world onto itself. He had got the fire going and then walked over to where Sammy was sitting and slumped down next to him. Sam had kept his eyes on Dean, following his every movement, blind to anything else.

Those moments, those in-between moments, were sometimes the stickiest ones, the easiest and the hardest. Sammy, looking like the survivor of some terrible battle, arms folded around his knees, eyes slowly slipping closed. Sammy, who could rip apart the fabric of this fragile thing around them with the sharpness of his razor wire words, was still, was worn out. And Dean had put an arm around Sam's shoulders and just sat there, savoring the beating of his heart, the feeling of pushing air in and out of his lungs with Sammy slowly falling asleep against his side and a shotgun braced over his knee.

Dean misses that. Even that, or maybe that more than anything. It’s murky, because all the things they are get so unbelievably tangled and he can’t get away from that. The thing is, even when Sam tries to make him let go, Sammy can’t get away from it either, because he’s still holding on too. There’s a tug of war there that’s never going to be over. Most of the time Dean’s okay with that. At least when it hurts he’s feeling something.

Sam' always been good at walking away, at running. He's done it before. Dean kind of gets that. He also kind of understands that when Sam runs it's never really been about him. Sam told him after Flagstaff. Jesus, Arizona, what a mess that had been. Dad had been livid and Dean had been terrified in that non-localized way that made his heart thud and his head hurt. Sam was in the wind and much, much too good at hiding. They'd taught him well.

When Dean found him, because of course Dean did, knows the kid better than anyone, and besides, Sam was... well, Sam was about done by then, wanted to come home. Dean had been so pissed, so angry and so relieved that he didn't know what he wanted to do. He sort of wanted to give Sam a hiding and hug him so close he'd squeeze the life out of him at the same time. And Sammy had hung on to him, face pressed into Dean's jacket at the shoulder and shaking like he was shipwrecked. That's where it had all come out, Sam telling him, mouth full of cloth “it's not you, Dean, it's not you” like that made any kind of fucking difference. Maybe it did.

Yeah, it kind of did. And it does now too, because Sam is saying the same things, saying “I never said I don't want my family”. Sam means different things with that than most little brothers. That's what Dean is. Family in the deepest sense of the word, and shit, Dean knows that, he does. He understands that. It's not like he doesn't get it, it's not like he hasn't always known Sam is too smart, too good, too fucking bright to keep hanging on to Dean's tattered sleeve for the rest of his probably too short life.

Being what he is, where Sam is going, Dean can't follow. And a part of him is relieved. Dean's willing to admit that when he's driving in South Carolina with his elbow out the window and one lax hand on the wheel. He's not really thinking much of anything, just letting his thoughts rove. He's on the 20 and there's nothing in particular going on and like a homing pigeon his thoughts go to Sam, because that's just the way Dean's wired. Has been, is, and will be.

So that means Dean starts thinking about the way Sam sounds when they talk. Still pleased to hear from Dean, but muted. And all that weary sadness does worse things to Dean than the angry accusations and the demands and entitlement. Little brother is hurting and Dean can't help the way that makes him want to do something. He's not sure what. Or, he knows exactly what, but he's still not thinking about that, because he shouldn't. Even the strangely distant “miss you” that Sam still gives him every time they talk is writing all kinds of bad checks with Dean. He's fighting it, but it's still a goddamned losing battle and Dean knows that. He knows. It’s pyrrhic victory at best, what he’s doing.

So dad is off to meet with some contact that has something to do with the big job dad keeps working when he thinks Dean isn't looking. Same job as always, the thing that killed mom and left them like they are now, twisted out of alignment and being buffeted buy the winds of fate and Dean seriously thinks it's bullshit that dad's keeping that as some kind of need-to-know, but then the old man's always had his own way of doing things. You can't teach that kind of old dog those particular new tricks so he just takes the pick-up job dad throws him, get some new bullets done... and Dean's not asking where dad got the silver, because the less he knows about that, the better. Funny thing about that is that they can make their own, but Jimmy Ironbear is much better at it, and he and dad go way back, so there's the kind of observance to history there that matters to dad.

And Dean's on his way already, driving towards Palo Alto pretending not to know where he's going, trying to fool himself that he's not going to go see Sammy, and that the thought of it makes his head fuzz out in white static and his heart attune its beating to the dull bass of the music he's not even hearing despite the fact that he's turned it all the fucking way up. Back in Black, and yes, of course, that's making him think of things he shouldn't be thinking of too. Like the way Sam flushes when things are good. The way Dean’s far too fucking weak to keep thinking that he's going to be able to stay away.

Dean doesn't try to talk himself out of it once he realizes where he's headed. He just drives.

It's easy. Well, maybe not easy, not like that, not really. But it ain't all that hard either. And there's the part where he's not telling dad shit, figures that goes both ways. And he's not telling Sammy much either. It's smarter to not say anything in case he gets sidetracked, because keeping promises has never been a problem when it comes to Sam, but Dean’s going to be cautious about making any, what with the road being what it is, and the job and the nights... and that's about all the bullshit excuses he's in the mood for making to himself. It's all about as clear as he needs it to be. Which is... not very.

Dean knows where Sam lives. Knows he's living alone after his roommates spectacular, but very quiet, breakdown about three months previous. No one else has been assigned to Sam's room and Dean figures that's got something to do with Sam's nightmares. Little brother probably has a little bit of a reputation. Sammy’s bound to be known for other things too. Kind, helpful, mild-mannered. Dean's seen his covers before. Polite, if Sam has managed to keep that up. Competitive as all hell when riled. Good at logical argumentation techniques. Scholarship smart. Good enough for the full ride, and needing it, what with his busted up old jeans and his ratty back-pack and all his belongings stuffed in one duffel. Dean knows how it all looks, rough and ready, and he's willing to bet that's where Sam's told them “army brat”, and he was trained that way. Never carry more than you need.

So when Dean knocks on Sam's door, one long, two short, pause, one short, he's not exactly surprised when Sam tears open the door and more or less tackles him into the opposite wall yelling about what an asshole he is. Dean's back thumps into the plaster, breath going out of him like he's been punched, because Sammy's not holding back. Dean's arms go around Sam more or less in self-defense, because his body is reading this as an attack, and his heart rate spikes accordingly.

He isn't getting any kind of chance at recovery either, because Sam's mouth is at his neck, talking wild and sounding angry, even if that's not what this is. Sammy's just reacting, reacting by acting, more like it. Jarringly honest and angry-pleased and calling Dean all kinds of things. Yeah, that's Dean's darling little brother, all right. Perfectly capable of hugging the living hell out of him, while still giving him abuse. Dean just holds on for a while. When Sam curses low against his skin he knows this has gone on for long enough.

-We doing this in the hallway? Really? Dean asks and Sam pulls back, smiling mad-glad and keeping one hand fisted in Dean's shirt so he can drag him along, even when Dean's not putting up any kind of fight and sort of laughing. Shit, Sammy's strong when he's like this.

Dean has just enough time to scope the room, bare brick wall at one end, one bed neatly made, the other stripped and covered with a blanket, serving as some kind of book display for Sam's various literature. Dark curtains, one small desk, overflowing. Mind map on the wall. Stack of books by the occupied bed. Stack of books by the tiny desk. Stack of books next to the other stack of books. Yeah, Sammy's been living here for a while.

-Asshole, Sam says and grabs on to him again and Dean's up against the door, Sam plastered to his front and … whoa, kissing.

Dean needs to put the breaks on that, because wait, hold on, that's not... Okay, not unprecedented and maybe not even unexpected if he's being honest, but there's too much desperation and Dean didn't mean for this to be like that. Doesn't mean this to be like that. Dean gets a hand on Sam's chest, bones under his fingers, damn it, Sammy's too skinny. Only when he tries to push, Sam makes this sound, this low warning not-done-yet noise. Dean grabs a handful of Sam's hair and kisses back just enough for Sam to loose some of the tension in his muscles and then he tugs, none too gently. Sam's eyes are dark, wild and half-closed when Dean gets a look at them. There's anger there, familiar and so fucking welcome after all these weeks of duller and duller report.   
-Why didn't you tell me you were coming? Sam asks.  
-Wasn't sure I was.

Sam really doesn't like that, fights to get back in closer, like that's going to prove some kind of point for him, but Dean's already getting an imprint of the gun he's got tucked in the back of his jeans and he's pretty much got Sam plastered to his front, so tight and snug he's not all the way sure he's not going to have a bruise in the shape of Sam's belt buckle. Might get his buttons too.

-Slow down, Dean tells him.  
-No, Sam says, perfectly reasonable, tone calm and sure, and grinds in closer.

Dean's grip turns punishing. Sam doesn't even flinch, just hisses between his teeth and fights it. Fuck, he's stubborn.

-You smell like a barn-burner. What have you been doing? Shit, I've missed you, Sam mumbles in between kissing licks at Dean's skin and then there’s the rough slide of his hips, one hand coming up to Dean's neck and the other pressing to the ribs on Dean's left side.  
-Peel me off the fucking wall and I'll tell you, Dean tries and Sam just huffs a quiet laugh, warm air skating Dean's mouth and then they're right back to kissing again, only this time Dean's not even trying to pretend to fight it.

He gives every bit as good as he's getting and Sam isn't letting up. Dean's starting to feel like Sam's not going to be done until he's had Dean like this right up against the goddamned door and it's not at all the way he's seen this going.

-Okay, you know what? Dean gets out and pushes with his whole body, forcing Sam to take a step back unless he wants to lose his balance.

Sam moves with him, still holding on to him, all easy compliance and soft stepping, shaking his head. Dean's too messed up to even think about that until Sam's tongue rolls back into his mouth, slow and deep and with so much to it that he goes, not thinking, not thinking about it at all, which is so goddamned stupid, because Sam is so smart. And Sam is backing up so Dean has to step to him, keep that golden roll going until they're at the goddamned bed and Sam's stripping him out of his jacket and no, wait, that's not the way this was supposed to go.

Because Sammy left. And Sam wants things that Dean's pretty sure aren't going to be appeased with one fast dirty fuck, or even a slow dirty fuck, and they're not like that, they're not there, it's not what Dean meant. Sam’s hands are so all over him, though, that when Sam pulls, down he goes, landing half on top of Sam with his knees and elbows braced for impact.

Dean doesn’t have a prayer. He is truly, deeply screwed and it only gets worse when Sam’s hands find their way in under his tee and Sam’s spreads his legs for him. All this time and they’ve never quite done that, though Sam isn’t taking any kind of no from Dean right now, as if he said something with coming here that he’s not even all that clear on himself.

Dean tries to pull back, even with everything in him screaming at him to go to it instead. Sam's got one hand planted solidly between his shoulder blades and he's still rolling his hips in that clever way that doesn't make things any easier. Dean didn't come here for this. Shit, he's not sure what the hell he thought he was coming here for. In hindsight he should have known. Truth be told, though, some things are what they are, solid and significant and not at all that easy to get around.

Sam is looking at him, light shining out of his eyes and a sharp edge to his smile.

-You going to make me ask? Beg? Really? 'Cause I will, I swear, Sam says and he sounds like all those late night conversations, wrapped in too close and too direct to be ignored.

Sam's bed is narrow, there's scant light playing around in the gloom and Dean's lost. He knew from the moment he pointed the Impala towards California. He might have been telling himself this is not what he came here for, but that's not exactly the truth. Dean props himself on one elbow, chest pressed tight against Sam's, and runs his free hand up Sam's neck, over his jawbone, up his temple, light careful fingers, and combs slowly through Sam’s hair, pushing it out of his face. Takes in the flush, the hectic light in Sam's gaze, the shadows lurking there and the dark smudge under his eyes. Sammy's skinny and worn, he's not as tanned and rested and happy as Dean has been wanting him to be.

-I didn't come here for this, Dean tries to say, but it goes deep and husky when Sam rolls his hips up again, thighs spreading out wider and his hand so warm at Dean's back.  
-I don't care, Sam says slowly, softly, like a promise. “You're here now.”

And just like Dean's been thinking that's sort of the problem. There are things he can't promise, even if Sam can make him want to. Dean thinks he should... do better. Be better. He thinks he shouldn't be lying on the bed on top of his little brother, thinking about how to make good on the promises in Sam's eyes, in his voice, made with his hands. Dean just came here to make sure Sammy's okay.

-No, Sam tells him as a response to whatever he's reading in Dean's eyes.  
-Sammy...  
-No. You're here. That's. It's okay. It's just … you and me.

Dean thinks that's so fucking wrong it's kind of grating, but yeah, whatever. Things will go however they want and there's not a damned thing Dean can do about that now. Maybe if he had been smart enough to never point the car in Sam's direction he could have avoided this, but for now they're here and they're in this and there's no way in hell he can extricate himself. Sam is so warm under him, so close and so good.

-Be here with me, okay? Sam says.

Dean figures this is what it is and lowers himself enough that he can kiss Sam, losing the sweetness, like there was even a choice to make here. Sam's languid against him just long enough for Dean to get lulled by it and then his hands grasp and hold on and he hooks a leg behind Dean's knee, sliding his mouth away to talk hot against Dean's skin about exactly what he wants Dean to do, and Dean knows he's going to, even when he's still shaking his head.

Sam's words send heat skating down his spine and he shivers all the way through in a way that makes Sam laugh low and content when he feels it. Sam's smart enough, always smart enough. He knows what to say and how to say it. The dirtiest words he can find turn into appeals and Dean's already moving against him, the deep driven need making that too good already. And he's been missing this, he's been missing this more than he could confess late at night over the phone. Sam doesn't have any of those restrictions. Sam tells him everything he's been missing, every dirty detail, while he works on Dean's clothes and his own. And no matter how Dean tries to tug and pull and shift them, Sam stays on his back, keeps Dean pressed in close. When Dean tries to slide down his body Sam holds him right where he is, long legs and strong hands and talking, all the while talking like Dean's not going blind from all this already.

-No, no, no, not this time. This time you're fucking me, Dean. I want, I want you to fuck me. I've been using my fingers, thinking about you, about this.

And, Christ, Sam doesn't fight fair. Not that Dean exactly expected him to.

The way they are together on Sam's Spartan bed makes the time between now and before seem inconsequential. It's all haze and dream shift, nothing noteworthy going on between here and there, despite the four of five times Dean's been in mortal danger, despite the times he's been working with dad or just trailing behind and he really needs to not be thinking about John Winchester when he's working two fingers steadily into Sam while licking at him.

It all blows straight out of his mind like so many dried autumn leaves when Sam reaches down and slides his own long slender middle finger in along with Dean's while making the dirtiest pleased noise Dean's heard in his life. He curses at Sam and Sam groans a laugh back at him.

-Taking too long, Sam gets out.

Dean's not arguing that. Little brat wants it so bad, Dean’s going to give it to him. Dean means to be more careful than this, saw himself laying Sammy out and taking his goddamned time, but Sam's shaking with it already, hips shifting and a fine sheen of sweat breaking over the flush of his skin and Dean's already there, already in position before he thinks it all the way through. Sam is moving into it, hips rising and Dean's done thinking about what should and shouldn't be by then, if he's ever really paid it any serious mind.

There are things about this that hit harder than Dean expected. It's not the fact that he's got heat running like a team of wild horses through his blood, or that he's got a strangely known desperation bubbling under the rising pleasure. Those things are all about Sam. It's more got to do with how Sam searches out his eyes and keeps coming back to his mouth, craning his neck up to be kissed over and over, shallow but sincere. It's breaking and mending things in Dean, all that need and desperation.

Sam wasn't lying either, he's been doing something that makes this easy for him, he's been longing this into being and he's good like this too, all touch and movement, willing and easy when it should be hurting them both more than it is. Even the slight digs of Sam's chewed-down nails aren't painful.

They go crashing into it, it can't really last when there's been this much separation, all this time between them, all this distance. And Dean's kissing Sam when Sam loses it with a low murmured groan that says something like “still mine, thank you” and Dean doesn't want to hear his name in there, but he knows the vowels and consonants that trip over Sam's slack lips. He's never been so far from home and so close to something like it at the same time. It's not about the moral implications anymore, the illegality or the confusion of taboo with sanctuary. Dean's just been stupid, led by his dick and his love for his little brother and there's triumph in Sam's voice along with the gratitude and when Dean thinks about that in the absolute clarity brought on by holding Sam to him after he figures he's still the one that's been fucked here, no matter that Sam’s been purring under him.

Sam's bed is too small for the two of them, even when they're interlocked. Sam's bed is a monkish cot, but wrecked and messed now. Dean kind of wants to lay here and let Sammy stay like he is, his head on Dean's chest, ear resting pressed to his slowly calming heartbeat. He kind of wants to get up and pull on his jeans and go for pizza too. And he wants to run. Get in the car and drive and not look back, but that's an impulse he's grown pretty familiar with over the years. It hits harder when he has this revelation that no one's ever been like Sam, no one's ever felt like Sam. No one's as good as Sam. Best lay of Dean’s miserable life, right here with his tousled hair tickling Dean's throat and his hand resting calmly possessive against Dean's side.

-Missed you, Sam says, slurred around a palpable smile.

And Dean gives a quiet laugh. There's nothing else he can do at this point. It takes a few seconds for the implication of that to sink in.

-Oh, you're kidding me, Dean says.

Sam just shifts his head, nips at Dean's chest in reply. No, no, he's not kidding. That's … something.

-You want to run, don't you? Sam asks a while later when Dean's giving a slow caress over little brother's back, thinking about not much of anything other than sweat and sleek skin, the brittle hard ridges of bones underneath, the irregularity of scars and the soft tickle of hair and bristle.

-Was thinking about getting something to eat.

Sam keeps his head down, letting all his weight settle against Dean in a way that makes it feel like he weighs a ton. It's oddly comfortable in all the wrong ways, the way it feels like Sam's bones are making an imprint on Dean, interlocking.   
-Not what I meant. I can feed you, Sam says.  
-Don't you have stuff to do?  
-Losing track of time again? It's Saturday.

Dean closes his eyes. Yeah, he's been losing track of time and place, and purpose too, judging from the way he's too comfortable here. His gun and cell are placed strategically on top of Sam's neat stack of books in Dean’s line of sight. He scans the titles idly and comes up with the usual stuff, the hard edges of his fight-or-flight reflex smoothed out by Sam's weight on him. “Hagakure”, he reads. ”The Language of Change”, ”The Sociology of Deviant Behavior”, “The Black Death: Natural and Human Disaster in Medieval Europe”. Sammy up to all his usual tricks.

Whatever habits Dean has are there for a reason. Getting up and getting cleaned up and putting the room between them feels like what he should be doing, because Dean can hear people moving around close by, footsteps and voices and just the shuffle of regular life. He doesn't bother asking “do they know about me?” because Dean knows Sam hasn't told anyone anything about anything. Never did unless he absolutely had to. Smart Sammy with his cutting whip of a mind, his ruthless adherence to the rules when they suit him and his blatant disregard when they don't. He's still not Dean's to have like this and that's the kicker.

Dean does want to run. Should want to run, he amends, but there's not much of a chance of that. Sam would take it the wrong way, or maybe that should be the right way. Dean compromises, pulls himself up until he's sitting with a pillow bunched behind his back, leaning on the wall. Sam doesn't compromise, no surprise there. He turns on his side, scoots and shifts and ends up with his head resting on Dean's thigh and his curved spine making his ass stick out almost over the edge of the bed. The rest of him is neatly folded in and he has one hand resting on Dean's bad knee. Dean knows this from when they were younger, when Sam had nightmares, night terrors, when Dean was trapped, standing guard. It's all about the same now, but so fucking different, because he was far away from this, far away from Sam, and still he got dragged here by that same fucking pull that has him always as aware of Sam as he is of his own body when they're in a room together.

Dean slides his fingers through Sam's hair once or twice, mindless comfort, though he's not sure which one of them needs the touch.

-How is he? Sam asks quietly.  
-I don't even have pants on, Sammy, please.

Sam snorts a kind of laugh at him. Pushes with his head against Dean's fingers and Dean takes the hint, cards through again, slow and steady, firm touches.

-He still pissed?  
-You know what he's like.

Sam doesn't say anything to that. Sam does know what he's like. Part of the thing between Sam and dad is that they do know what the other is like and still it won’t matter when they get into it. Dad still talks to Sam the way he wants him to be, the way he wants him to react, and Sam still fights it with everything he's got, for no reason Dean could ever fathom. Dean's smack in the middle of that, the most predictable out of the three of them, probably. Something about that itches at the back of his mind at times.

Sam is all this, only twice more complicated. Sam is the kind of kid, no, the kind of guy, who will talk to Dean every week for more than a fucking year and still not let go of anything, not even the way he … the way he wants this. It is about that too. The way Sam wants things is frightening, because he will have what he wants, by force, by wile, by lies, by his own determination. Any way he can get it, really, and Dean knows that, knows it's just what they taught him, him and dad, and they shouldn't have been surprised when it reared up and bit them on the ass. Not with Sammy. Sam's always been different, one of the live ones. The most truly unpredictable variable in the Winchester trifecta.

Dean's going to have to make sure to stock up Sam's fridge before he goes and leave some of his earnings somewhere nice and inconspicuous, because Sammy's too fucking skinny. He's seeing too much of the clear lines of knobbly vertebrae from this vantage point.

-I had a … well, a sort of friend for a while, Sam says suddenly. “Told me to get over whatever the hell was eating at me and go out there and seize the day, all that shit.”  
-Good advice, Dean says, but it's weak.  
-Not really. Dean, I never wanted it to go down like that. You got to know.  
-I do know. Doesn't change anything.

Sam raises his head, looks Dean square in the eyes.

-You're here now.  
-Yeah. But I ain't staying, Dean says and reaches down deep for a smirk, like this is just any other fast track, one night, drifter-passing-through thing.

Sam's eyes go heavy and serious and there's far too much moving behind his gaze.

They go out to get something to eat and Dean watches the way Sam moves the whole time. Tall and lanky, yes, but he carries himself with the easy confidence of someone who is at home in the environment and in his own skin. That last thing might be in part because Sam's just gotten laid right, but Dean thinks it's more than that. This kind of freedom suits Sam. There's more to it, though, 'cause there always is.

Sammy isn't looking after himself as well as he should be. He's still too much whipcord over bone, muscles there and in clear definition, but still clinging to his frame like he hasn't figured out the whole three meals a day thing yet. They find a nice unremarkable Italian place and Dean watches as Sam inhales about his body weight in ravioli, not talking much. There's this look in his eyes, though. Nothing starry eyed, or vague about it, but sure, smug and really fucking intense every time Dean looks back at him.

Dean keeps thinking he's got to make sure Sammy gets that he's not staying. He’s distracted by the clean line of Sam's cheekbone, the light that changes his eyes from green to brown and back again. Dean’s distracted by the way Sam looks back at him, all focus and drive and something else smoldering underneath that sends a warm pleasant awareness all the way down to his lower stomach. It's a promise, that look. It's five nights if hard core fucking and a long lazy afternoon of drinking beer by the pool, Jesus Christ. Not that they’re going to do any of those things.


	4. Down Deep

-It’s about having a choice.

That’s what Sam says later when Dean’s still panting from what they’ve done together.

To Dean California had been about so much sunshine and blue ocean and girls dotting green lawns like butterflies in their pretty bright dresses. To Dean California had been the kind of place where Sam would go to shine and be a part of all the things that were all about the light, the daylight and the sunshine and the golden glow of youth and promise and all that oh, so very predictable and trite shit that dreams of a better future are made of.

He hadn’t figured that Sam would be carrying the darkness of the way they came into the world and the way they were raised in the life so plain for anyone to see. Dean’s not sure what California is about now.

-The way you live is shitty, Dean. The way we lived was so fucking hard. It doesn’t have to be that way.

That doesn’t hurt, not even a little, because those are known things, that’s nothing he hasn’t heard from Sam before. It’s just that … well, Dean figured once Sam got out, got this far, things would be different for him in a more obvious way. When he looks around the room, the tiny, dingy little room crowded with books, it isn’t different enough. And when he looks at Sam, he isn’t either.

It’s not that there’s ever going to be a way to fix it, any of it. Sammy wanted out, so he’s trying to get out, but Dean’s gone and done a stupid, stupid thing. All those conversations that Dean has been trying to keep nice and easy and clean haven’t really been anything of the sort, when he looks at it all from the outside. When they’re together they don’t talk like that, like they do on the phone. They talk like they always have, half sentences and word jumble coupled with what Sam refers to as brother-code. Just the way he tilts his head tells Dean more about what he’s thinking anyway. It’s always been like that with them.

He shouldn’t have done this. That he does know. Stupid. So, so stupid and Sammy’s usually so smart.

-I know he’s got you so wrapped up you think this is all there is to you, Dean, the hunt. But it’s not, Sam says.

Dean leans down and weaves his fingers tight in Sam’s hair, making him flinch from the force of it and making his eyes water. Dean’s hurting him and Sam’s holding real still, but he’s not going anywhere, not trying to get away and that’s part of the problem. Dean makes sure Sam sees his eyes this time, makes sure to put it all there for Sam to read.

-It’s all I know how to do. It’s all I’m good for, Dean says and his voice is calm and level, not angry at all.  
-You want more?

Dean can swear by anything that it is enough. He can take oaths. He can give more reassurance. It wouldn’t matter if he did. Of course he wants more, but he’s not like Sammy. Dean doesn’t get what he wants. It doesn’t matter, though, it really doesn’t. He’s made his peace with it. Did that one night by a burning pyre when he was sixteen and fresh off his first kill. There was a stench of burning hair drifting on the night breeze and dad’s hand heavy on his shoulder saying “you did good, son”. Dean knew then.

It’s not about approval. It’s maybe not even about saving people.

Dean’s gone through doors first to make the best likely target so Sam doesn’t have to. And he’s going to keep doing that. Dean’s got blood on him, and he can’t come back from that, he can’t be something other than what he is, because it’s not a case of wolf in sheep’s clothing with him, it’s all wolf in wolf’s clothing. Dad’s made sure of that.

-He said to stay gone. Do you think that too? Sam asks, all annoyance and confrontation, but still not moving.  
-I’m here, aren’t I?  
-Yeah. But not staying.  
-You never thought I would, Dean tells him and leans down to kiss.

It helps sometimes.

Even when he has Sammy like this, kneeling for him, putting his hands on Dean’s hips, long fingers splayed to hold on to more of him, it isn’t like it was. This is borrowed… stolen. Sammy’s not with him anymore and he can’t be someone who rolls into town once or twice a month and steals from Sam. That is what he’s doing. Stealing. This is not his to have, not anymore, and Dean misses things about Sam being there with him in the hunt, in the car, in whatever lumpy creaking motel bed that they’d find shelter in. Sammy doesn’t want that anymore. That knowledge hurts a little deeper than Dean expected it too when he really thinks about it, so he tries not to.

The thing is, what Sam waked away from was not just the life, no matter how he tries to say it was. There’s a synonymy there, something they don’t much discuss. The hunt. Dean. It’s not something they’ve ever talked about because it’s always been a given.

And this thing with him and Sam… It’s not doing Sammy any good.

Dean knows that already, but it solidifies for him when a beautiful blonde spills California sunshine on Sam on their way out to breakfast the next day and Sam only says “hey” and keeps right on walking, eyes all for Dean, not even stopping to introduce them. It gnaws on him all through breakfast, Sam eating triple helpings and drinking fresh orange juice and smiling broad and open at Dean every time he looks up, while something crawls down the back of Dean’s spine that feels like bleak regrets.

He thinks about the things he misses and sees the world of shadows he would drag Sam back to if he thought at all that he could. Endless days in the car, endless nights of vigil and digging in a graveyard. Too many hours spent in libraries and county records halls. Fake names, fake addresses, fake lives to go with that, anything to get them in the door. And it all feels like sucking mud under his boots, pulling him down and dragging Sam down right along with him.

Dean knows that if he lets Sam spin out the yarn he’s got waiting, the things that feel more like a huge big trawling net, Sammy will tell him about night school or a job at an auto shop, because Dean’s good with his hands, good with cars. Sam will talk about an apartment, a solid base and weekend hunts and things that look probable to him, things that look possible, when Dean knows they’re not.

Dad’s going to call, and soon.

Dad’s going to call and ask for those bullets that Dean needs to go pick up as soon as Ironbear’s done and then he’s going to be on the road again and that’s in a Canned Heat kind of way, complete with “lord have mercy” and all. Sammy has no place in that. Dean wants things, it’s true. He might want to have Sam by his side, and he’s willing to give a lot for that to be. Maybe too much.

Thing is, he can’t. Shouldn’t.

Sam is too much of a bright spark to be buried under all that crap, always has been, and he’s seen a lot, done a lot already, but he’s at least got some kind of real shot at getting out and being done with the life Dean’s destined for and the things Sammy wants are not any goddamned part of that. So now, Sammy’s made his choice and he’s held to it by family and blood, same as Dean, but with a wildly different direction. And Dean can make that choice. He can walk away. That’s the thing he knows how to do to make this right, make it better.

It’s not what he wants. But the thing is, Dean already knows he doesn’t get what he wants.

When Dean thinks about this later, much, much later, he’s going to hate himself a little. That’s okay, though, he’s not unfamiliar with that feeling. He’s done things to hate himself for before for Sam and this is the big one.

Dean leaves in the early morning hours past the third night, because he can’t give himself any less than that. He’s covered with Sam’s marks, Sam’s mouth and hands. His boots make no noise on the stairs. There’s too many bright vivid images in his mind as it is, Sam’s hand gliding slow and easy along his thigh, Sammy’s eyes all summer and serious still under that, wild and beautiful. Sammy’s wants all laid out before Dean like the life that he could have lead if he had been anyone but who he is, if he had anything in his veins other than Winchester blood.

But Dean’s not that kind of stupid, at least. He didn’t lie to Sam, not once. Never said he was going to stay, never said he was going to come back.

Dean figures when he’s on the road he’s got a couple of hours before Sam starts calling and he’s got to be ready for that. It’s likely to break him, either way and he’s going to have to do something to make Sam understand.

In the end that part’s ridiculously easy.

Dean’s with Ironbear talking skinwalkers when Sam calls and it goes to voicemail. Sam doesn’t even sound angry, just tired and disheartened. Dean’s sitting behind the wheel, holding on and listening so closely he hears every intake of breath, every slight scuff and shuffle on the other end.

 _“I can’t make you. I get that. But there is a choice, Dean, you know there is. I have to do this, I fucking have to, okay? It was killing me, living like that, not being able to… Dean, you know I had to. You know. But I won’t… I won’t make you. So you call me when you can, okay?”_

Dean doesn’t call.

There’s this whole thing, this whole huge big, mess of a thing between them and Dean knows that if he calls he’ll be right back in it. Sam won’t be able to see past it, not even in the smallest ways. Dean can’t be the one to do that to him, not when everything else is going the way Sam seems to have planned it out. Sam’s not going to be able to see past him if he keeps this up, the phone calls and the things that he has been telling himself are just brotherly concern.

It’s not like he didn’t get a swooping sense of joy when Sammy told him about that girl that one time, the one that wasn’t anything. It’s not like he didn’t feel the clench of desire at Sam’s “they’re nothing like you”. It’s not like he didn’t wait for every single “miss you” with so much honest to god hunger he made himself a little sick with it.

Sam’s going to swing around to anger. He always works harder when he’s got something to prove. He’s going to give it longer than most people, because he is a stubborn little shit, always has been. He’s going to come to the point where he says “fuck you, Dean, fuck you, you bastard” and Dean’s going to let him. Sam’s going to dig in, heels planted solidly and he’s going to try three times as hard as anyone else around him to make something of himself. He’s going to go for the blond with the legs. He’s going to be at the top of every single class he takes and he’s going to read until his eyes bleed to get any- and everyone’s special notice.

Maybe that will burn out the darkness he comes from with time, Dean can’t say that for sure. It might be too deep in him to ever really be eradicated that way, but if he can’t burn it out, he’ll learn to hide it.

It is about choice, Sam’s right about that. Dean’s doing now what he should have done all those years ago. He’s making the choice for both of them, because it is the right thing to do and Dean’s record with doing the right thing isn’t exactly untarnished, but he’ll give it a try this once. He can do that. He’ll get it right this time, the motivation is exactly the same as him making sure he went through every door first to draw all the fire.

Sam's not the only one who's stubborn. It runs in the family thicker than blood, most times, that trait. Dean grits his teeth through the messages, the long angry ones and the short ones that sound so dejected, so fucking broken he feels it through his whole body like a long ripple of pain. There are other things in Sam's voice some nights, always when it's late and when Sam's messed up. It's not pleading, it's desire, thick and coiled and tainted with a deep down anger that makes Dean's hair stand on end and his dick hard and his palms sweaty, because he can hear it, he can hear how Sam's got a hand on himself. He can hear how it works like poison through Sammy, the want thick in his voice, rough and desperate and reluctant. Sammy gets so fucking angry with himself, with Dean when he won't pick up, and it's all a vicious knock to the head, an onslaught of need and hostility and under that … the deeper sense of having been betrayed that lays like a sick fog over everything Sam says.

Those aren't the worst ones.

The worst nights are when Sam calls still in the clutches of a nightmare and asks, voice tight and stressed, for Dean to let him know he's okay, still alive, not eaten or busted or bleeding out.

 _“Please, Dean. Just. I need to know you're still breathing, okay? You don't have to call. And. And I won't pick up if you do. Just... something, okay? A text, just so I know you're... please.”  
_  
On nights like that Dean wants to talk to Sammy, talk him down, make sure he knows that they're both okay, he's still breathing, still alive and kicking. He doesn't. Not even once.

It's nothing like ripping off a band aid. It's nothing like a quick, clean break. It's nothing like easy. Not for him, and certainly not for Sam. The thing is, it doesn't stop like Dean thought it would, after a couple of weeks. Over long months it slows to a trickle, but there's still a kind of junky desperation to Sam's voice on some calls, like he wants to stop, but he doesn't know how to anymore.

Dean's become something else for Sam. He can feel how it shifts, meaning turning different with the wintry distance in Sam's tone, his anger burning down to ashes and then turning to cold stone. He still listens to every message, some kind of perverse loyalty and mirroring need in him that won't let him sever that connection. He needs to know that Sammy's okay, just as badly as Sam needs it some nights. The chill of Sam's anger hurts as bad as the hot burn, that's all there is too it.

 _“I took her out, Dean, the blonde with the legs. Just like you wanted. Let her take me back to her place and fucked her, just like you wanted. Let her go down on me, and she was willing, Dean, so fucking willing, but she couldn't take more than an inch maybe. Nothing like... ah, nothing like when … oh, fuck.”_

Dean doesn't hear that one out at first. He gets a hot rush, because he knows what comes next and he's sitting at the counter in a nondescript diner shoulder to shoulder with dad and that's not the time or the place. Sam knows how to make three minutes count when he sets his mind to it, like the one that starts with _“... you fucking asshole, you goddamned coward. I miss you, so much, you don't even. Damn it, Dean, just...”_ And Dean listens to the way the words fray and break down, to the way hurt renders it all meaningless and pointless, all his resistance, all his effort, all gone to waste, because Sammy has a girl now, and the message is from two in the morning, so Sammy's still stuck, can't get past it.

It all turns in on itself, bad to worse and if it wasn't anything before it sure as fuck is now, because there are days when he looks at his phone like it's a viper ready to strike. Sammy knows that he won't pick up by now but there's no doubt that he will listen and Sam rambles at him sometimes, rails and berates and it's all underscored with the same hardcore longing. Sammy knows he has a captive audience.

Dean works really fucking hard to discipline himself to not save anything. He's conflicted, because there are a few that leave him gutted in the best possible way and he wants those words over and over until they're branded into him. It's hurting them both and Dean keeps telling himself it's for the best. Pain is good, pain is better than the other thing, the ache he can't do anything about anymore, other than just fucking endure it.

 _“...you son of a bitch, you bastard, why won't you just fucking... call me, Dean, come on, please. It won't be like. I won't, okay? Not anymore, I swear I won't. I just want to hear your voice, please, Dean. Please-please, okay, just… fucking please.”_

Not that one. He doesn't want to save that one.

 _“I had this crazy notion when I came out here that everything would be easy, you know what I mean? Just, school and reading and ... I saw you in all that. I never thought you'd come with me, Dean, I'm not that naïve. But, all my life you've looked out for me and I thought maybe, just maybe, dad would be willing to trade off for a little while. Let me have my brother here to watch my back, you know, like when we were kids. I should have known better, right? Happy birthday, Big Brother. Happy birthday, you goddamned asshole. Hope you're up to your eyeballs in booze and pussy.”_

The thing about that last one, is that on the surface it’s all fine, Sam sounded like he was laying down on his back, relaxed, calm, talking to Dean after a long day, words trickling out of him slow and steady, like he'd talked to Dean in so many places so many times. Until Dean listens to it again and hears the way Sammy’s breathing, the way he’s holding it all back a hair's breath away from crying, from the kind of bottomless pit of despair that’s so fucking ugly, this huge smear of shadow-life and desperation that makes Dean need to … get his hands on Sam some way, hold on to him. Desperation and a deeper bone-weary sadness there between them.

The thing about being raised in it like Dean's been is that he knows prayers. He knows the Latin of them, and he can rattle them off like nothing. He also knows that he lacks the crucial ingredient for them all, the honesty of something that is faith. But he's heard it, on Father Murphy, on Father O'Reilley. He's heard the intonation of those that have it living down deep in their souls. And when Sam says his name, when Sam curses him out and calls him a bastard, when Sam says he misses Dean, it sounds just like that. Like a goddamned sacrament.

The problem with the thing between them is that it's so old. “All my life”, Dean finds himself thinking, like it's not a funhouse mirror distortion of what things should be. He has reasons, reasonable reasons, why he doesn't do the easiest thing, pick up the goddamned phone. This is for the best. This is the right choice.

You always have a choice. You might not like the options, but there always is one.

Dean has to remind himself of all those reasonable reasons every time his cell goes off. It doesn't peter out for him either, that overwhelming sense of connection, of disconnect when he hears Sam sounding so much like the little brother he swore to always protect, to never leave behind.

He keeps tabs. None of that drive-by bullshit that dad does, either. When Dean goes in he loses his jacket, ditches the Impala and walks in Sam's footsteps until he sees that everything is under control. He keeps an eye on Sam's credit card and his cell phone and he makes sure. Or, he tries to, anyway. There are wards in place and Dean puts money in Sam’s account sometimes. It's all he can do and he does it without question, without asking for dad's okay, without talking to Sam about it. Sam doesn't argue him on it, surprisingly. Dean kind of figured that Sam would blow a gasket about the money, if nothing else, but all he gets is a quiet “thanks” tacked on at the end of a rambling message one night. And that is kind of weird because Sammy usually bridles at anything that feels even vaguely like control. It isn't, either. It's just Dean looking out for him.

All of this is, really.  

Sam’s made him crazy. And it’s the kind of crazy that stays. It’s not an easy thing to know about yourself, that you’re twisted down deep that way, that you are beholden to someone like that, to the point where you can’t let go, ever, even when you try. Dean’s pretty sure that’s not what dad intended when he delivered Sammy into Dean’s hands and told him to take care of his little brother.


	5. Rhetorical

Sam came up with this thing when they were really just kids and they were trying to learn how to work. It didn’t come from dad. It actually made dad a little uncomfortable, judging from the look Dean had caught on the old man’s face a couple of times when he’d seen them doing it. Awareness exercise, that was the idea. Something about spatial attentiveness and control. They’d been practicing things like knowing where the other was in relation to them in an open space, or in an enclosed space, working blind sometimes, in the dark, that kind of thing. There had been mirroring, sort of like Follow the Leader, but more intense. They got good at it, him and Sammy.

It appealed to Sam, for whatever reason, much more than boxing or stick fighting. It was one of those things that put them on an equal footing no matter how many years and pounds and inches there were to separate them. So they started out doing it to find a way to stay aware of each other without needing visual confirmation. It was a good tool for Dean, who usually had his eyes on something bad coming for them. It evolved quickly. They got so good at it they stopped being conscious of when they were doing it.

Sam would come sit next to him on the couch and before Dean was even mindful of it they were sitting exactly the same, thighs splayed apart, knees touching, hands hanging down and clasped. Then Sam would shift, straighten up, and Dean would too a fraction of a second slower. Or Sam would stretch out a leg, show the sole of his boot and Dean would move the obverse leg, leaving their knees in contact. They’d ask the same question at the exact same second or give the same reply with the same inflection. They’d move like hinged parts of a configuration when they were interrupted in training, turning to face whatever was coming at them in perfect pace.

It freaked people out, dad most notably, but others too.

Those were nothing to the times when Sam and Dean stood in some field alone, after having sparred, after having done target practice and did this mirroring thing on purpose that would maybe have felt stupid if it wasn’t for the fact that it synched them up until Dean could have sworn they were breathing in time, their heart beats keeping pace, swift and easy and it didn’t feel stupid at all, because when they walked away from it he felt lighter. It made him laugh and Sammy along with him.

Leaves him wondering now if Sam was so desperate to break out because he was so deep in that the boundaries were blurring and morphing into something else, something that didn’t feel like a clear line. Something that felt like a bond to hold more than just what they were back then, both the things they were supposed to be and the things they shouldn’t have been. Crazy, crazy things. He should have looked away from the subtle maturity in Sam’s eyes.

Back then it had been easy.  
Keep Sammy safe. Stick together. Fuck everything else.

Even now, with Lord knows how many miles between them, they’re still so tangled up in each other it’s hard to know how to deal with. Dean’s not always sure he likes it. They’re fucked up enough as it is without it.

Dean has a thousand pieces of Sam tucked away in random corners of his mind. Blue days, black days, little things that seem insignificant. The way Sam likes peanuts but has had enough of peanut butter. The way he can smile, lighting up a whole fucking room. The way he can finish Dean’s sentences. The way he uses Dean’s name. It's not his fault that Sam still lives in his head the way he does. It's not Dean's fault he raised the boy up and then had to watch him walk out.

“ _I know what you’re doing. This is some kind of distancing technique, right? This is you doing what you think is best for me. You don’t got to worry so much about that, I  got it covered. I know what’s best for me, I do. And the thing is, Dean, you’re part of that. You really, really are. You hearing me?_ ”

Dad slips up sometimes. He says “you boys” once or twice when they're talking rendezvous points, like Sammy's still riding shotgun. He starts to divvy up research between the three of them more than once too, stopping himself just when he's about to relegate Sam to library duty and there's always an abrupt silence when he does. Dean doesn't make it a thing, there's no point. What they are isn't all that affected anyway. They can hunt, it's not like they're crippled by Sammy's absence. Dad tells Dean one day when they meet up after having been at all points of the compass that Sammy's got a girlfriend and Dean doesn't even blink. He just says “bet she's a looker” and dad smiles at him, tight and controlled. So that's all there is to it, just Sammy living in a different world, like he's a million miles away and not one of them anymore.

Working with dad is… It’s easy because it has to be, because it needs to be. But it’s lonely in a way that nothing could ever have prepared Dean for. It leaves him at loose ends, swinging in the wind after a job when dad climbs in his truck and Dean climbs in the Chevy and there’s nothing else, no trash talk, no come down, no run through, no one to look after, no one to eat dawn pancakes with. There’s no freedom in that. Just loneliness.

Having a lifetime of battle ahead means you need to make it your life. Sam with that crazy fucking genius brain of his is not going to be anything as simple as a foot soldier, and Dean always knew that. That’s why… that’s why California with its blue, blue ocean and it’s blond girls and it’s near perfection. That’s _why_. Dean knows Sam is not just smart in the regular sense of the word. He’s met plenty of smart people, plenty of guys who are wily and crafty and street wise and all the other things that you need to be to keep yourself alive when you’re a hunter, but Sam’s the only one who can think so far outside the box there isn’t even a box anymore. Sam’s the only one who would laugh at something he heard on TV, saying “the illusion of free will, man, it’s the drug of choice for this whole fucking glorious nation. People are sheep”.

Dean kind of knew what that meant. Free will as a concept is not something that bothers him overmuch, he’s more of a “deal with what’s in front of you” kind of guy. Some nights that was just Sam. Sam with his million-miles-a-minute brain and it never fit in the life, it never turned over sweet and purring like Dean’s girl does for him when he’s been treating her right. Sam hated the life. But there’s more to it than that. Sam had reasons.

It isn’t like Dean couldn’t use that right now, that deeply disparaging cynicism of Sam’s that felt fucking wrong when it came out of his mouth when he was a colt of fourteen, but that made all the more sense for it, even if Dean never wanted to believe those were things that Sam really believed. Except for how he knew it kind of was. “Liberty is the absence of external impediments” and “this hypothetical liberty is universally allowed to belong to everyone who is not a prisoner and in chains”. Dean had read that scrawled on the back of a flap torn off the top part of their off brand Quaker oats imitation breakfast one morning while sucking down his coffee and watching Sam trace sigils in the condensation left behind by his glass of water on the vinyl tablecloth.  

Maybe it wasn’t cynicism. Maybe it was Sam working on a problem. Same as he would work on a different problem when he straddled Dean’s thighs and ground them together late at night, careful not to make the bed squeak, holding on to Dean’s ribs and swallowing every noise back until it was little more than breath against Dean’s neck.

“Why are we like this, Dean?” Sam had asked one night while still holding on and moving so strong against Dean that he couldn’t think beyond getting his hands on Sammy, mouth on his dick, anything, only to have Sam restrain him, just like they were, still fully clothed and shaking with it. He’d told his little brother he didn’t know. And that’s the truth, he doesn’t know why they are the way they are. He’s not too inclined to worry about it either.

Freedom of will isn’t the same as freedom of action, Sam taught Dean that too. He sort of gets that one. Context is everything. Freedom of action would maybe have meant flipping Sam over and pinning him to the bed, sucking the questioning look right off Sam’s face, every doubt, every uncertainly gone under the slide of Dean’s mouth, the hard shove of Sam’s hips.

“Causal determinism can preclude free will, but not moral responsibility”. That’s another of those things that Dean found scribbled on some random scrap of paper. That’s Sammy for you. Still not all there is too him, though, like there are fifty more layers to peel back, because even with that it was still “Oh, fuck, Dean. _Harder_ ” and Sam would still demand to be taken to service on a Sunday. All that stuff… made Dean think Sam is brain’s a scary place. And that’s just when you’re looking in from the outside.

So now Dean has this whole thing where he wakes up in the morning and stares at the ceiling and wonders if all that was just a prelude to Sam walking out, to Sam doing what he’s doing now, talking about family, which Dean knows means only him, even when he’s got a girl, and he’s got a girl, someone he lives with, someone who shares his mornings and nights and that’s not Dean, that’s not the same as family. It’s all very … domestic, though, and that’s nothing Dean’s got either, nothing he can offer. Dean’s got guns and blood and violence and dad snoring softly on the other bed when he’s around, which he isn’t all that much anymore. Even less lately.

Dean wears the charm Sam gave him, but he’s not sure what the hell he believes in, if anything at all, other than things he can feel with his hands, see with his eyes. In the mornings Dean tells himself to get out of bed and fucking get on with it, life, the business of living it, hunting evil shit and killing things and when he thinks about that, if he thinks about it, he has an even harder time putting his goddamned feet on the floor. Sometimes his cell blinks at him, messages, voicemail. Sometimes he thinks about just killing that fucking thing too, stomping it under his boot so he can be done with it. It’s an impulse that never really lasts beyond the first soft “hey” that usually starts Sam’s rambles.

Sam still talks to him all the goddamned time. Or, at him, anyway. He doesn't go for the kill quite as often, but there's still seething animosity and wrecking ball courage and angry hungry longing in there. He doesn't think about the fucking consequences of what he's saying, what it's doing to Dean. Sam doesn't talk like they're friends. He talks to Dean like a brother he knows too well, like someone he's used to having.

“ _It’s not either or. It doesn’t have to be. I can have this and my family too. Lots of kids go to college and it’s not the end of the world. Their families come see them all the time, Big Brother. They’re proud of them.  Don’t you want me to have that?_ ”

Stupid question. Dean wants Sam to have everything. Except for the things he’s forfeited. Sam can’t have those. It isn’t like Dean doesn’t miss Sam, of course he fucking does. Sam is his best friend. Sam’s more than that, sure, but he’s that too and that’s just one more thing that Dean’s lost in all this. His best fucking friend, since… well, since always, since little Sammy clenched a fist around Dean’s own chubby finger and gummed at him, toothlessly. So fucking stupid the whole thing, just. And Dean doesn’t go a day without thinking about what Sam would make of this thing or that. Little things like… when he finds a really spectacular breakfast place that’s nice and clean and cheap and serves prefect hash browns that arrive all crisp and golden, just the way Sammy likes them.

Sam’s a stubborn little shit, though. There’s never really been anyone who could make him do anything he doesn’t want to do. Maybe that was one of the reasons Dean never really worried about this thing between them, the thing that wasn’t anything, but that might be something now. Well, definitely is something now, if he’s going to be honest. There were a couple of times, towards the end there, where he didn’t just go to his knees for Sam, Sam put him on his knees. So, Dean’s never really given it much thought. It’s Sammy. Hard to reconcile that with this distance. Dean knows it needs to be this way, more now than ever before with a serious girl in the mix.

Dean doesn’t really sleep all that well when Sam’s not in the room with him. They don’t have to be bedded down together, or anything like that, just… Somewhere near. So now, Dean’s an even lighter sleeper than he was. Sam’s got this girl that he’s shacked up with, so hopefully Sam’s doing better. And Dean thinks about all the nights he’s woke up with Sam plastered to his side, trembling and making these little noises, like something was hurting him. He’s woken Sam, slow and careful so many times. Lay there with Sam’s leg slung over his hips and rubbed at his back, his ass, his thigh until Sam started moving against him. Dean’s got some memories that leave him shaking now. Sliding his hand into Sam’s boxers to rub over the pucker of his hole while Sam rubbed himself off on his hip, huffing small breaths over Dean’s neck and mouthing at the skin there, something so primal and deeply needy in it that it was all just about comfort, getting back to sleep.

Sam’s asked a couple of times “what are we doing?” and Dean figures he should probably have paid better attention to that question than just saying “we’re not doing anything”. And when Sam got down on his knees and did for Dean just as easily it was never taking advantage, because god knows, Sam’s too stubborn and willful for anyone to ever be able to do that, but even if it wasn’t, it felt wrong somehow. Sam, who could always put his smart mouth to good use, did that for Dean and Dean would watch his pretty lashes fan down over his cheek and his lips get swollen and used and he would stroke over Sam’s cheekbone with gentle fingers and think that this wasn’t anything, but it was something and sometimes it wasn’t right, because…Sam is different. Sam is more. Worth more. Sam could have said no, would have if and when he didn’t want it, but he never said no. It doesn’t make Dean any less morally responsible. He paid attention to that, at least, even if all that stuff about free will and people in chains pretty much overshot the mark with Dean.

Do as you will, forbear as you will, that was what it was all about for Sam, sort of. Sam wanted it. That was enough. Dean must have thought a thousand times how Sam doesn’t belong in the life, doesn’t deserve it, and he’s trying real hard to remember that now. Not that that helps any when Dean’s out here in the cold freezing his balls off and looking for some way to conserve body heat while he waits. The hunt he’s on is simple, too simple to keep his mind occupied. All he has to do is wait for the colo-beast thing to come out of the shadows and take the bait he’s stuck out for it. It’s supposed to look like a long rat with feathers, serpent scales and rooster’s head and fuck knows if that’s a good description of if someone was just smoking a little too much the night they wrote that down.

Hasn’t heard from dad in days. It’s starting to nag a little, an absentminded kind of concern, because dad’s been sketchy about checking in lately and when he does it’s just as often just coordinates, like this fucking thing. Dean’s aware that the wind is picking up and he tries to not sniffle, snot thickening in his nose and his knees starting to hurt. He’s huddled down, but it would be better with another body at his side to help keep warm. If Sam had been here, though, Dean would have been looking at him thinking “he doesn’t belong here, he doesn’t deserve this” no matter if he would catch the sickle of Sam’s grin in the half light. That would only make Dean think “he shouldn’t be here, he should be somewhere better, safe”. Not that any of that means shit now that Sam is somewhere else. Maybe better, maybe not. Who the fuck knows, right? Dean pulls his jacket tighter and tries really fucking hard to not think of anything at all while he waits.

“ _I get scared for you. I worry. I think about the shit I know and my imagination runs wild, man, it really does. I think about this stuff when I’m in class, when I’m studying… when I really shouldn’t be. I wonder where you are, what you’re doing, if you’re safe. That won’t go away just because you don’t call. You know that, right?_ ”

This is what Dean gets sitting on his motel bed in just his boxers, straight out of the shower and scrubbing a too rough towel over his hair. He put his hand over the phone to feel it ringing and still didn’t pick up, because he doesn’t do that. Felt the vibration in his palm, traveling skin still damp from the muggy heat of the bathroom. He’s tempted. He’s tempted in ways that are similar to the way the soft skin in the crease of Sam’s thigh would tempt touch. And Sam’s still got that uncanny knack for knowing when Dean’s in it up to his elbows. That thing tonight wasn’t supposed to be difficult, but now his neck and shoulders are killing him from struggling to hold that thing still while he cut off the head. It’s a kind of pleasant pain, strain and tug and pull, without the vicious wrenching of something too big for him to handle. Makes Dean think maybe he’ll get more than four hours of sleep tonight.

All that stuff Sammy read didn’t really help him with the nightmares. Dean thinks that’s kind of fucking stupid. He’s not sure which part is more stupid, the part where it didn’t help, or the part where it maybe just made everything worse. It wasn’t like thinking about what a being thinking about itself being a being is was going to do anything about the way Sam dreamt of monsters, right? Because it wasn’t like Sam was pulling the stuff he dreamt about out of bad horror B-movies. He was taking from what he already knew, what dad had taught them and what he’d seen himself. It was jacked, sure, but then most things about the way they came up in the world were kind of jacked.

Sometimes it’s still like that for Sam, Dean knows, because Sam’s told him more than once. Shit, Dean hates those messages, the ones that start with “I dreamt about…” Those are always nauseating. Sometimes the things Sam has been dreaming are a little too close for comfort. That means Dean starts thinking about how they used to sleep together. Not the fucking, never mind that for right now, but the actual sleeping. Even with Sam restless by his side it was still better than this. Dean drops the towel on the floor and kicks it vaguely in the direction of the bathroom.

Cramped quarters, Sam restive by his side, kicking at him, tugging at the blankets, trying to stay still only to fidget again after another couple of seconds. All that was … annoying as all get-out. But then there was Sam, tucked in close and neat, folded into him, arms and legs going in and over and under like a goddamned cat’s cradle. They’d sleep like that. No distance, no point in trying to maintain any either. Sam’s hand on his stomach. Sam breathing soft and slow against his neck.

Those aren’t the most recent memories, though. That thing out there, when he went to Cali, when he fucking drove out there, yeah, those are different, because Sam hadn’t been like he was when he was young and jailbait sweet. Those latest nights had been underlain with something different, Sam’s body harder against his, all whipcord and still with more muscle to him than Dean was used to and he’d twined himself around Dean differently too. Holding on differently, arms and legs wrapping around Dean like he couldn’t get close enough, didn’t trust Dean to still be there in the morning, not that he’d been wrong about that, exactly.

Dean thinks he should be more sure about what he’s doing. Lays back on the bed, phone on his chest now, right over his sternum and he thinks that if it were to ring right fucking now, he’s going to pick up. He’s going to. And he’s not sure if that’s a supplication, an invocation or something tinged with unease. Doesn’t always feel sure about this thing he’s doing, that it’s smart, that it’s right. Sam’s a bright spark. Dean’s not that, not even a little, but he’s sorry. The things he’s sorry for aren’t really the kinds of things that he thinks he should be sorry for, though, and that’s kind of the bitch of the situation.

It’s not like that with Sam. Sam’s not supposed to be someone who has to just… make do with whatever he can con out of life. He’s supposed to be doing a lot better, have more, be more. Dad’s in this life and Dean’s in it up to the hilt, no other choice for them, but Sammy, he’s got a real out, something he worked for and something he can have, really. Truly. Dean stays away so he won’t pull Sam back in, but there are nights, sort of like this one, when that’s all Dean really wants. Drag Sam back, drag him all the way down, right into his bed there alongside Dean with his sharp elbows and his wide, generous mouth and his million dollar mind. It’s trivial, the way Dean misses him. Pointless, too.

Dean’s doing this, trying so hard to just get it right, but Sam won’t play by the rules. Not even the longer silences, the times when Dean thinks he might have just… moved on, work at all. Weeks go by, Dean ignores the itch in his mind, ignores the way he stares at the display, thinking “speed dial” and “Sammy” and ignoring the way he's still a little disgusted with himself over that other thing that is not him letting go, but him hanging there, like he's waiting. He puts it all into other things and tries to make that enough. Dean goes for women exclusively these days. Preferably small, petite women that feel breakable against him. Makes it a little easier not to go anywhere untoward in his head.

There were days when Dean almost believed that he could settle Sam into the shotgun seat and keep him there, but it was basically daydreaming and he knew that from the minute Sam shook his head when dad wanted him to ditch school and go on a three day hunt. Sam was thirteen, if he was a day, and he was already so serious about anything that wasn't the life. At thirteen Dean had been always rearing to go, to be a part of it. He still thought of dad as a hero back then, wanted to be one too.

Those were long days for Dean, all of those days were so fucking long. He can recall the details of them now, those times when he stood at some kitchen sink and made sandwiches for all of them, fueling Sam's growth spurt with day old bread and nothing less than every last dime he made bagging groceries. He can recall without any trouble the dinged cans and dented chocolate bars he bought with his employee discount. All that stuff was easy to do because Sammy was there, starving right out of his skin, drawing tall and getting that look around his eyes that never really went away.

“ _Want me to lay out the argument for you, Dean? ‘Cause I will if it helps. It doesn’t feel like you’re doing what’s best. It feels like you’re taking sides. It feels like you’re saying stay gone, don’t come back. You gonna turn your back on me too? What if I need you?_ ”

There’s a pattern. Takes Dean a while to pick up on it. Sam tells him stuff now, all the things they never talked about get slowly brought out into the light. Or, well, not the light. All the things Dean would have stopped Sam from saying if they were face to face get spoken, low and soft and earnest. Sam’s got his reasoning voice on. He’s asking questions that are beyond rhetorical. They both know the answers to all those things.

Dean’s too wrong in the head to not go after him if Sammy needs him.

So far he’s just really pretty sure that Sam doesn’t.


	6. Response

The only thing left for Dean is the hunt.

That sounds like business as usual, but it's really not. He's watching people walk by past the window of the hole in the wall he's eating at. They've got this shelf along the front, high stools that wouldn't be out of place at a bar and the demolished remnants of his breakfast have been pushed aside to make room for the paper he's sort of reading, idly scanning the local news and the obits by rote, thinking about where to go next, what to do. Dad's been going off on his own, leaving Dean to pick up the slack on standard hauntings and little things that are mostly just salt'n'burn rock'n'roll. He's fine with that, he's used to it, but the thing is... well, it didn't use to feel like this, like he's at a loose end, more or less haunting the highways himself.

Dean knows he's good enough to do the job, but it feels like their hermetic little unit is scattering in the wind like so much chaff and Dean's not good with that kind of isolation, he's just not. It's the random moments when he hears the girl sitting next to him tell her friend “so I told him he could just do a three sixty and walk out of here if he didn't like it” when he misses Sam fiercely because he can see Sam make that face, the one where it looks like it actually pains him that he finds something like that funny, how completely fucking stupid people can be. Dean misses the way dad will just rest his hand heavily on Dean's shoulder for a second when he stands as if he needs to ground himself and Dean can do that for him.

The girls that Dean passes the time with can’t stand in for the near-violent crashing collision he and Sam got into when tempers were running high. And Dean needs that sometimes. It's not a philosophical need, more something that tugs darkly at him, dragging memories out of the corners of his mind at strange moments. The thing about being fucked up in that particular Winchester way is that it all comes down to the basest instincts, the slick moments after chasing three miles through a dense copse of trees or fighting for your life in a graveyard, or just flushing hot in a bar when a fist fight seems unavoidable. Dean remembers all those sharp-as-blades grins of Sam's when they locked gazes for a split second and knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that ten minutes later they'd be in the bathroom, or around a corner with their hands all over each other, Sam's teeth digging in somewhere near his collarbone. Slick hot tongue gliding along Dean’s. Sam's hands hugely possessive and life affirming down Dean’s jeans. His own hands on Sam's ass rocking him closer, headless and hard.

Dean can't get that anywhere else, because there are things lacking, understanding for one, but shared past more than anything. Sam talking low and hot against the side of his neck “Jesus, fuck, Dean, come on” and he knew what that was about, the slur of Sam's wet mouth and the heat of his breath. Dean can play nice with the best of them, but it's not what he really is. Not at his most basic. Sam slow and sweet sometimes, kissing like he had days to get it just right, the shuddering arch of his body rubbing up against Dean and his mouth working soft and careful. But there was always the other side too, the one that gave absolutely no quarter and asked for none either, the side that wanted to get off fast and rough and so fucking good that they both had to hang on to each other after, for however long they had, seconds, minutes, a goddamned lifetime.

The company Dean finds is nice, passes the time just fine, isn't looking for anything more than that and that's never really been an issue because Dean doesn't have all that much to offer beyond pretty straightforward pleasure. But that's just getting off and that's something he needs the same way you need food so you won't starve. Dean isn't really comfortable thinking about all the other things that he's not getting, like some honest to goodness good company. Just being alive isn't enough. That's not something that should surprise anyone and it still does every time. Sam's got a girl, though. He's got a girl and Dean knows him well enough to know he's going to let that be enough. Dean's a dog, but like a dog he's loyal in his way, even if he's more of a stray and feral thing these days and he knows that it shows on him, in the way his clothes hang a little too loose on his frame and the way he can't unwind even when he wants to, always on alert, checking the exits and keeping his back to the wall. It's partly just him being cautious, the way he’s been taught, but it's more acute now because he's alone.

And that's the fucking thing. Dad's gone, out and gone for weeks at a time and only meeting back up when they work something that needs both of them. It's not like that hasn't been going on for years, but before there was always Sam to go under Dean's wing and keep his mind occupied and now there's nothing. Sam never does anything by half measures. Not when it matters, not when he really gives a shit, so Sam is going to be living this relationship with that girl of his like she's his future. Sam's going to be settling in for domesticity like he belongs in that static normal world and he's going to be soft-smiling at her and thinking about what comes next. Problem is, under that, deeper down, running like some murky underground current there's still this thing with him and Sam and it's time to stop acting like it isn't anything, because Dean's so fucked up over Sam that he can't get his goddamned head on straight and that only gets worse now that he's on his own so much. And he really, truly is on his own now, dad acting like this is what he always intended instead of it being a slow systematic decline of everything they've worked the last fifteen years to arrive at, plus or minus a few minor details that dad fucking well better never find out about. Sam is the only person who has the power to completely fuck Dean up. Dad can get to him, sure, way down deep where it counts. It’s worlds apart, though, nothing like what Sammy can do to him without even really trying.  

Sam is on Dean's mind more than he'd like most of the time and that's still true when Dean meets Cassie. He's not looking for anything, just working a job in Ohio with dad and he more or less stumbles over her, literally. It's all fumbling and awkward for a moment, but she's nice, smells nice and has big, bright eyes and a body that is just what the doctor ordered, all curves and a pert little ass and she's sharp, smart and has a wicked gleam in her eyes when she shots him down. Dean catches her looking him over, though, slow, and then smiling away from him like she likes what she sees and doesn't want to let on that that's what's going through her head, like Dean hasn't seen that before, like he doesn't know exactly what that is.

The sex leaves Dean warm and satisfied physically, but he's not stupid enough to think that he's going to get to relax beyond a few moments of purely animal gratification and whatever comes with that. Cassie keeps him around for breakfast and makes him stay in her bed while she lays more or less across his chest and tells him about what an ass her professor is while she eats an apple she's sliced into neat wedges. Her kitchen knives are no where near as sharp as Sam's switch and she keeps her eyes on what she's doing the whole time like she's scared of taking her fingers off and Sam never even looked down when he cored his apples other than to give them an appraising gaze. Dean has this petulant moment where he thinks “well, if Sam can have this then so can I”, but that's just … reaction. That's all it really is, that's all Cassie ever is. Cassandra, if you please. Jesus, Dean's not blind to the irony. He'd have to be a lot more fucking stupid than he is not to catch that one, even if no one would ever call her that, because she doesn't like it, says it's pretentious and there's Sam-Sammy and Cassandra-Cassie and Jesus, just, someone cutting Dean a break sometime soon would be nice. Not likely. But, nice none the less. He won't go there, he doesn't mean to go there, comparisons are unfair and it's like apples and oranges anyway with Cassie and Sam – in the most literal way possible.

Dean's not sure what the hell he's thinking when he lets her bicker and wheedle and flat out call him stupid until they get into this nit-picky kind of heated verbal slap and tickle that usually ends up with him pressing her into the mattress and kissing her quiet. He doesn't do this kind of thing, but he's got to be thinking sideways these days because it feels like he could. Stay. Keep this. It feels like he could, but he and dad crack the case and they're dragging on late with the shit they have to go through. It all takes too long. He's made some promises he can't possibly keep and Cassie won't just let it go because she thinks he's cheating on her, “stepping out on her”, she says like they're in some forties movie and it's so fucking stupid. He can't explain his comings and goings with the flimsy excuses he's got and if he wants anything at all from her, she wants him to be honest. She keeps saying that over and over, wants honesty, wants the truth, “just tell me the truth, Dean”. Yeah, right.

Turns out that the truth he has so offer is nothing Cassie wants. Not even a little. And she kicks him to the curb without a second thought, calling him crazy and keeping an eye on him the whole five minutes it takes him to hunt down one of his shirts before getting the hell out of Dodge. He's got Jack Nicholson in his head saying “you can't handle the truth” and he's laughing into the sharp silence of the car going way too fucking fast as he drives out of town. He can’t have any of that, and it’s not like he really thought he could, not like he really believed it. And it’s not like he told it all anyway. Hunting things, being a hunter, living on the margins, that’s actually what Dean does, not all he is, and it sure as fuck isn’t the biggest secret he’s got.  

Sam’s got a temper. That’s not something he gives in to a lot, but when he gets really righteously angry it was always slow burns that would turn into one of those hold-on-to-you-horses and get the fuck out of the way things. Cassie’s more of a firecracker, snapping hard and pretty much like watching a drop of water fizzing on a hot plate. The thing about when she tossed Dean out on his ass was that she wasn’t angry. She was scared. He knew her well enough by then to know what that looked like, wide eyes and flare, her hair almost visibly trembling around her fine features. He scared her. That’s what the truth did, even just that little bit of it.

Dad is developing some new habits to go with the altered circumstance. They still have working together down pretty solid as long as Dean just obeys orders and he's never really had an issue with that. There are some external impediments for Dean, some chains, some moral responsibility, but he doesn't mind. It anchors him. It's kind of a liar's paradox the way Dean's been saying he doesn't care. You go with what you've got and it's never as much, or as rich as you might wish, but wishes don't really matter when it comes to the unmitigated shit-storm of Dean's life. He takes dad's orders, because he has to trust that dad has a better plan than him, a better idea of where they're going and what they're doing. Dean can't be responsible for all that, he's going to mess it up. Witness the inevitable, which is Sam.

Dean knows everything there is to know about how smart Sammy is. There are weeks when Dean doesn't hear from him and he uses every bit of mental discipline he has at those times to not fall into bad habits. That would mean listening to old messages, tracking Sam more actively, going out there to fucking lurk in the shadows like a goddamned stalker. Dean won't do those things, he won't be that.

“ _You always looked out for me. I know you’re still doing it, too.  Next time you’re here, come talk to me, ‘cause that’s not fair, Dean, you seeing me when I’m not allowed to see you? I got a right to make sure you’re okay,  in one piece. Next time I see you, I’m gonna come after  you. Just so you know_.”

Dean doesn’t go back to Cali for a long while after that. He thinks about it, but he doesn’t go. Too close, close enough that Sammy caught sight of him, and he’s always been so careful. Kind of stupid to think Sam wouldn’t catch on sooner or later, feel the prickle of eyes on him, get that cold shiver. It’s just another habit Dean needs to break.

There’s the thing that happened in Sammy’s bleak dorm room on his narrow monk’s bed in the vague light of early dawn. Dean going slow, as slow as he could stand, with Sammy cursing at him saying “I’ve been waiting so long for you to fuck me, Dean. Wanted it so bad, been wanting it, you have no idea”. Not true, Dean had an idea. More than one, oh, yeah, because Sam’s never been exactly shy about what he wants, how he wants it. In more idealistic moments Dean thinks he did something good with Sam, seeing how he turned out strong and brave and so fucking smart, but that might be just as much despite Dean as because of him, he’s never going to know for sure. Sam had wanted him, Jesus, how he had wanted him, all spread out and begging for it, one hand on the back of his own thigh, holding himself open and a truly beautiful sight with his mouth slack from too much sensation and looking just wrecked with it.

The addiction came on so fast for Dean he’s been spinning from it ever since, that glazed look in Sam’s eyes that was so much “oh, yeah, right there” that Dean has to be careful when he thinks about that. They fit so goddamned right together, work so well, better than anyone, better than anything else Dean’s had before, or since, because Sam’s voice broke on a gasped kind of laugh, all pleased and wrecked and pleading in a way that’s seared into Dean’s bones now. Sam laying himself out under Dean like he never figured it would go any other way if Dean ever came to see him and maybe that’s what it was all about for Sam, just having that, Dean doesn’t even really know, but he doesn’t think that’s all it is. He thinks the connection is the same for Sam, has always been the same for Sam, but that means he’s fully capable of forsaking it all if Dean… if Dean does something stupid like go back there and introduce himself to Sam’s friends, to his girl, insinuate himself into Sam’s life and then it would be something else entirely, clock-stopping meetings in some out of the way motel, because Sam will have his cake and eat it too.

Sam’s a moral guy, just like Dean, he’s always been good at moral responsibility, but all that tends to get sidetracked when they’re in a room together and their blood is up. They don’t do boundaries well. Sam’s always had a problem with authority and Dean’s always had a problem with keeping a handle on this thing between them. It feels like Sam overran him somewhere in his later teens, left Dean in his dust, even when he was still holding on so hard it hurt. Sam’s a prodigy, but he’s more than a little twisted, same as Dean with the same wind to bend him. Which means… Sam wants to have his cake and eat it too. It means that whatever there is between them it’s not got anything to do with anything else. Dean kind of fears that means Sam’s girl too, just like it would have done with Cassie for Dean if he had tried to stick around. The one thing doesn’t have shit to do with the other, so if Sam means business, and he does, he’s still going to be only a phone call away if it ever comes to that. He and Sam might fight, bitch, even hate each other sometimes, but if Dean picks up the phone and says “I need you” even Sam’s dreams of a bigger, better, brighter future aren’t going to mean shit. That’s the way in which they are most bent and twisted, him and Sam. Blood first, everything else second. And that really does mean _everything_. That thought should feel more reassuring than it actually does.

Dean looks up from dragging a carcass out from among the trees at the lumpy shadow where dad's keeping watch with a Mossberg 12 gauge aimed at random patches of forest. And knows that whatever else you call this, it sure as fuck isn't leaving the nest, but Dean's okay with that. He's in it, he's always been in it, and Sam's out. That's all he asks for sometimes. Sam out and safe, and he will sacrifice for that, he'll be the one. Sam’s not supposed to be in it, not like that. He's not supposed to be one of them. Doesn't want to be one of them. Chose not to be one of them. All this, it works out pretty well as long as Dean makes sure to think of it like that, like something that was always supposed to happen, and he knew it was, he knew it. But, sometimes, knowing a thing and dealing with it when it comes is harder than you expect.

John gives a nod in Dean's direction and he walks out to the middle of the small clearing, looking down at the misshapen lump they’ve been bringing along and sets his jaw. Fucking thing stinks like you wouldn't believe and Dean knows it's only going to get worse when they sets it on fire. So all this and he still can't be free of that impulse of checking his phone as soon as they're back in the safe quiet of the car. Dad actually grins at him when he catches Dean's disgusted expression, thinking it's because of the stench still hovering over them like a miasma. But the thing that looks like an outwards motion on Dean is just inner revulsion at the cloud of anticipation that hangs over him. He's aware of the fucked up state of his own mind and grins back, feeling sheepish and stupid and too fucking see-through.

Dad's there and aware and he's got the same partial watchfulness that he always uses on hunts and everywhere else too, the thing he's so good at that means he knows how Dean takes his coffee and how long he stayed out the night before and how messed up he is, all relating to his efficiency. They can actually go days without exchanging more than a few words and that's fine, that's the way they work best, but Dean still feels the loss of Sam from his side more acutely than John's every going to really understand. Dean puts it all into the hunt. He's good at that, at least.

Weeks go by and Dean tells himself it's good, Sammy's finally gotten the hint, Sam's finally moved on, got his shit together. And it hurts, sure, it aches. It isn't what Dean wants it to be, but then that's the way this has to work. That's the fucking deal. Sammy has a life, just like he wanted. That's the way these things are supposed to go, you grow up, you get a life, you move out of the nest, you make yourself an existence... but Dean was maybe four and a half years old the first time he put himself as a shield between his little brother and the world around them and he still can’t seem to lose that mindset.

Sam at fourteen wearing Dean’s shirt and a wild, wicked smile. Those nights when Sam’s mouth felt like absolution. Sam reading in the backseat, books held in one long-fingered hand, hair carelessly mussed by the wind and the way he absentmindedly pushed it out of his eyes. Sam up against him, razor-sharp hips and heat bleeding through the fabric of their jeans. Sam looking incongruously young when he walked up the stairs to some news school. Sam well-fucked and lazily petting at him, hands just gliding over Dean’s skin, tracing familiar patterns, wards, old scars. Dean didn’t really want to know what he was thinking, but that’s never stopped Sam. Sam and Sam and Sam. Fuck-all Dean can do about those memories that sneak up on him when he least expects it.

Dean buckles down and works. It’s all he can do. It’s all he’s good for. Lesson learned.

And then… well, two years. They don’t go by quickly, or painlessly, or even moderately easily, because no matter how much the hunt takes over Dean’s time he’s still got the rest of his life to weigh against all that, the rest of all that time with Sammy by his side, under his wing. Dean’s not sentimental about any of it, it’s not dreams of idyllic times gone by, because they fought and bit and scrapped and loathed each other at times too. The acceptance letters were a punch in the gut, and Sam and dad fighting was no fucking pick nick. Dean wears some of those memories like scars.

And then a couple of different things happen.

First dad takes off the way he’s been doing. He claps Dean on the shoulder, says something about a lead, something about a guy he needs to talk to about a thing, and he’s being even more vague than usual and that sets Dean’s teeth on edge, makes his insides go cold. There’s something badly off about the way dad delivers the lines, like he’s thinking about stuff that he just knows Dean won’t be able to handle. He sends Dean on a job in New Orleans and that’s fine too, that’s something that needs a hunter’s eye, someone selling death curses.

“ _I’ve been dreaming, Dean_ ”, Sam says and it comes out so soft and hurt it makes Dean’s insides tighten in response. “ _I just really needed to… And I know you don’t… it’s just. It really scares me this time_.”  

It’s kind of like a portent, really, and Dean won’t let himself think on it in any way, not good, not bad, because if he does… then all this is still for nothing and he’s going to be ditching this town with the job half done. So he keeps at it and buckles down and works and calls dad and tries really hard to think it’s all business as usual. At least they take their coffee seriously in New Orleans and it’s all black as the Devil, strong as death, sweet as love and hot as hell. Dean really approves of that.

What it all comes down to is something like fifty calls from him to dad that go unanswered or straight to voicemail and Dean’s starting to feel like this is some kind of karmic retribution for him not picking up with Sammy. Dean’s bad feeling has graduated to something set and fixed by the time dad does call back and Dean misses it because he’s in a really fucking loud bar and he can’t hear himself think over the zydeco music, which is just how he wanted it, but that means he doesn’t hear his phone ringing either. When he listens to the message he hears the crackle of wrong static. He hears the way dad’s voice goes strange and he knows what that is.

And then … then, there’s the other thing.

That night in Sam’s room.

-He said to stay gone. Do you think that too? Sam had asked with Dean’s hands deep in his hair, holding him there, keeping him, Dean’s hands saying too many things.  
-I’m here, aren’t I?  
-Yeah. But not staying, Sam telling him, not asking.    
-You never thought I would, Dean had said, bending down for a kiss that left them bloody and breathless.

Sam’s hands were on his thighs, kneading and then spreading his fingers wide and warm. It was all about family, the familiar, the blood between them. And Dean had never allowed himself to forget, even for a second how smart Sammy really is. Sam’s mouth hot and wet and inviting, his eyes too fucking old and too knowledgeable by far.  

-I got you here, Sam had told him. “You don't think I can make you stay?”

That’s what had made Dean run. That’s what made him stop taking the calls even if Sam never stopped making them. That’s the thing that had him leaving Sam’s room so quiet that the only thing he could hear was the thudding of his own heart beating jackrabbit fast in his chest, setting all his bruises alight. That and the fact that when Sam asked if he wanted more, he wasn’t really asking. He was offering.

That night Dean just … folded and knew that it wasn’t like it wasn’t anything, it was sure as fuck something and worse than that, maybe the only thing that fucking matters. Sam had been looking at him like he meant more, wanted more, fucking needed Dean more. And Dean couldn’t. He just … couldn’t. He wanted to stay. Wanted it in a way that he’s never wanted anything, wanted it like he’s been wanting to go back. Wanted it like he’s been wanting to pick up the phone every time he sees Sam’s name. It’s endless and relentless, the way Dean wants all that. He doesn’t want to do any of this alone, isn’t supposed to be doing it alone.

So… if he’s going to be telling Sam that he needs him for this, for all of it, he’s not going to do it over the goddamned phone. Dean finishes the job in The Big Easy fast after that, because every hour counts and dad’s probably in more deep shit than Dean is comfortable thinking about. He finishes and then he drives, thinking the whole way there that he should pick up the phone and just call Sam, just to tell him that he’s coming, but he’s pretty sure Sam is going to be pissed and he’s more than pretty sure that Sam is going to be reluctant to go help track down dad. So… Dean needs to be looking Sam in the eyes for this. He needs to be looking Sam in the eyes when he tells him that dad’s gone missing and that he needs Sam to be there, that he needs his help. It’s going to mess Sam up, Dean knows that already. It’s going to trip up Sam’s normal, throw him right off the track. It’s going to do a lot of other bad things too, but Dean can’t really afford to care about Sammy’s master plan right now. Dean’s a “deal with what’s in front of you” kind of guy.

What’s in front of him is moral responsibility, Sam’s temper, dad going MIA. What’s in front of him is the realization that this thing that he’s been trying for so long to be calm about is about blood, family. It’s more than that, though. This thing that he used to think was never anything, wasn’t really a part of his deepest foundation, is underpinning everything he is, or will be.

This thing with him and Sam is all there is.

That’s pretty much all he’s thinking about when he quietly breaks into Sam’s apartment a couple of nights later and waits for Sam to come find him.


End file.
